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Disgrace

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Disgrace

By: J.M. Coetzee
Narrated by: Jack Klaff
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About this listen

After years teaching Romantic poetry at the Technical University of Cape Town, David Lurie, middle-aged and twice divorced, has an impulsive affair with a student. The affair sours, he is denounced and summoned before a committee of inquiry. Willing to admit his guilt, but refusing to yield to pressure to repent publicly, he resigns and retreats to his daughter Lucy's isolated smallholding.

For a time, his daughter's influence and the natural rhythms of the farm promise to harmonise his discordant life. But the balance of power in the country is shifting. He and Lucy become victims of a savage and disturbing attack which brings into relief all the faultlines in their relationship.

By the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature and twice winner of the Booker Prize.

 Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction Political World Literature Fiction

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Critic reviews

What is remarkable about Coetzee’s vision as a novelist is that it remains intensely human, rooted in common experience and replete with failure, doubt and frustration
A masterpiece
Exhilarating... One of the best novelists alive
Coetzee captures with appalling skill the white dilemma in South Africa (Justin Cartwright)
Disgrace explores the furthest reaches of what it means to be human; it is at the frontier of world literature (Geoff Dyer)
A great novel by one of the finest authors writing in the English language today (Russel Celyn Jones)
Disgrace is a defining novel of our time, its apparently simple lyricism belying a grave incomprehension that threatens to sever our world in two. There is an answer, but it is very hard and painful to come to
A searing book, and though it is often called spare, it is delightfully intricate, containing a tissue of literary allusions that are brilliantly used (John Mullan, professor of English and Booker of Bookers Judge)
Told with searing emotional and intellectual honesty, this beautifully written novel is as much a meditation on parenthood, old age and the pursuit of love and beauty as it is a snapshot of a country in turmoil
Such dilemmas are so obviously at the heart of South African politics that the allegorical parallels are inescapable...the issues raised, such as the demands of justice versus the need for reconciliation, are timeless
All stars
Most relevant
I've never read one of his books before but this is a stunningly emotive and thoughtful novel
full of difficult subjects not easy to write and reflect upon within south Africa and beyond
the narrator was excellent as well

outstanding story and narration

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This is a profoundly challenging masterwork - I teach it and students are always hugely impressed (if not altogether taken in by Lurie!). It’s well handled by the reader, though female voice impersonation can - inevitably - be slightly grating.

Endlessly interesting

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I really enjoyed this. I found it's character portraits utterly convincing. The end was a slight let-down. I expected a sucker punch that brought it all together. Instead, it kind of fizzles, and the book deserves better.

Well performed, and well written. Overall, very good indeed.

Nine out of Ten

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I loved this book and the narrator Jack Klaff was perfect for the story and brought all the characters to life. One of the best narrators I have listened to. There are a lot of interesting perspectives in the story and I enjoyed every chapter.

Interesting and enjoyable book!

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At first, you end up loathing the cynical protagonist, a womanizing professor, who seems to have lost the will in life. Until the moment he realises the tragedy that befalls his daughter and that some things are out of his control.

The prose is poetic and decadent, but where I find some difficulties in processing is the protagonist's outlook of separating women into the virgin or prostitute category. What we understand is that the main character has actual little understanding around him. Very intriguing listen.

A sombre tale of choices

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