So today’s book is a fictional compilation of interviews from an author’s past lovers and friends, so a fictional biographer can piece them together. The author in question? John Coetzee. The real author of this work of fiction? John Coetzee. Yeah. I know.
J.M. Coetzee’s Summertime: fiction is an incredible tale about other people trying to find a human side to a man who produced mopey, often shallow or inhumane novels, only to discover the the man who wrote them wasn’t all that sharp or personable. An absolutely incredible work that takes some brass to even write. It is equal parts self-deprecating, entirely ambiguous with reality, and insane spectacle. Though it may sound like an over-indulgent and vain work, Coetzee balances his fictional self in a well-evened manner that takes some real self control to accomplish. Audacious? Yes, in the negative way. Brilliant? Yes, in the most positive of ways.
