The first few pages of Coetzee's new book Diary of a Bad Year were, at best, difficult to get through. The structure of the book is quite different from anything I've ever read. In the beginning, each page is separated into two sections, with the top section being a short essay describing a "strong opinion" on a specific subject (such as democracy, the war on terror, and pedophilia), and the bottom half explaining the narrator's encounters and lust for a woman who lives in his buildings. After several pages, each page is suddenly split into three sections, with the additional section narrated by this woman the narrator is attracted to. Needless to say, I spent a bit of time thinking: "What?"
Looking back, though, it actually was not that long before the format of the story completely drew me in because of the links between the three sections. It's almost as if Coetzee were writing a book, while allowing two characters to comment on the writing page by page. I kept wondering how much of this was Coetzee? Was he expressing his own opinions? (Why would he do otherwise?) Was he the male character? And the main question: Why write a book in such a way? Why not just write a book of political essays? Instead, he has two genres wrapped into one book, literally dividing the book in two. Then I realized that I would not typically read his book of political essays. Sure, I read the paper, and I read the New Yorker every week. But even I rarely get past the leads on the exhausted supply of political rancor and word-twisting. Would I read these opinions if it were not coupled with this rather ordinary tale of a woman and a man?
The book also shows the reality of a person's thoughts compared to that person's life. Here, on paper, the man is presenting educated, well-thought-out ideas about the greatest concerns of the present; but his spare time is completely used up with this lust/disgust/budding frienship toward a woman. Is this who we are: the inherent differences between thoughts and actions. And even Coetzee (or his narrator) asks what we should do? Do we just vote, just watch, sign petitions, what?
And even beyond this, Coetzee is changing the way I read. Instead of reading each page, then moving the next page, I begin to read by section, because on page 42 he suddenly starts having each section move to the next page mid-sentence. It's as if once I become accustomed to the unusual way in which he has arranged the book, he makes subtle shifts and changes until I am in fact a new kind of reader.
The surest sign that this book was fantastic is that I have written all over it: underlined sentences and entire paragraphs, asked questions in the margins, circled items I want to do further research on. I have discussed it with anyone who will listen. In the end, I still have many questions. I would love to sit down and talk with Coetzee, who seems to rarely if ever sit down to talk to anyone about his writing. But want to ask him why he made so many of his choices. And while I will probably be rereading this book in the future, I also wonder if I got so caught up in the carefully constructing structure of the novel that I missed the point somewhere along the line.
For more information:
New Yorker review
About the Author
Publisher's Weekly Article
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