Is Coetzee's "Disgrace" racist?

...or is the ANC too sensitive?

I saw the movie last week with my mom. I've always enjoyed Coetzee, and as skeptical as I was before seeing it, the movie did justice to the book. The final scene was different, which bothered me a bit. It ends not with David Lurie sitting on his plastic chair plucking his banjo, composing his opera, but instead with him having tea with his daughter. A reconciliation, a recognition that change and compromise is necessary. Perhaps it's the same idea, but the message resonates more in the book's final scene rather than the movie's.

I read Disgrace for an African Lit course I took at the University of Cape Town. While I thought the book was powerful, what really made it resonate was when I heard about the ANC's reactions to the book. They congratulated Coetzee in 2003 upon winning the Nobel Prize; however, shortly afterwards, they tacked backwards, clumsily calling the book racist.

And I agree with this view. Disgrace is a racist book. But that doesn't mean it's not brilliant, nor doesn't mean that it's not important and enlightening. It's productively racist--as idiotic as that phrase may sound. It's a book that powerfully captures Afrikaaner angst and frustration, while at the same time it shows the remnants of a racist Apartheid power structure that still hurts South African blacks and coloureds (captured by Lurie's lustful gall).

It lays bare post-Apartheid society; it brings the feel-good unity that Mandela's presidency ushered in, crashing back to earth. Crime and acrimony remain. And the characters struggle to deal with this reality.

But these characters are nearly all white. Nadine Gordimer captures this well, point out that, "[in Disgrace,] there is not one black person who is a real human being" (NY Times, 12/16/07). Petrus is a malevolent character driven by entrepreneurial greed. He protects his rapist brother-in-law, and exploits the defenseless Lucy. The white angst towards this character is tangible. Petrus is powerful. He protects his own without any moral qualms, and he underhandedly gobbles up white-owned land. He seems to taunt Lurie, by simply stating a banal fact of contemporary South Africa: "Everything dangerous today." And the only other black characters Coetzee introduces are rapists.

But while Disgrace recreates racist stereotypes--black men raping white women--it is not that simple a book. It's goes well beyond these stereotypes. For me, this point resonated when Lucy talks about her rape. In response to David's frustration and vengeful grief, she points the finger back at him, saying, "Maybe hating a woman or a man can make sex

more exciting. It must be a bit like killing …you’re a man … you should know."

Although Disgrace recreates racist stereotypes, I believe it's mistake to dismiss it as racist. I believe the ANC shows its thin skin by failing to recognize the depth of this book.

Nonetheless, I can understand their frustration. If I were a black South African, I don't think I'd feel much affinity towards this book. Disgrace seems to speak to and for Whites alone. It captures white fear and frustration, and it captures the difficulty and the pain of dealing with a new social order--one that seems to victimize progressive Whites more than racist old Afrikaaners.