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What is the story with you one Elizabeth Costello? she's starting to make me not enjoy the book. Does anyone else think that she is a bit nonsensical to the story? Bit like the annoying voice in your head that you just want to shut up, but personified? I really hope he does pound her in the head with his crutch!!!!
I've just met Elizabeth, so far she doesn't bug me. She reminds me of an Aunt, everybody has one, the kind that wear to much lipstick, always seems to know what's best for you and in most cases pushes you into doing it!!
So, how has everyone's reading been going. Anyone new done yet?
the more I think about the book, the less I like it. If i could I'd change my vote to the one below average (didn't like it much). I don't know, maybe it's because when I think about the book, all i think of is the costello woman. Maybe I should try to think about Marijana. I think she's my fav charater in the book.
I just finished the book.
I wonder about the enigmatic Elizabeth Costello character. How did she know so much about him and his past, not to mention his present problems with Marijana and the Jokics?
She seemed to know what he was thinking before he even thought it. She must have done a lot of research on him prior or something...
I'm wondering what she meant when she said "you came to me."
Wouldn't it be weird if the whole book was really meant to be in Elizabeth Costello's head? I don't mean that seriously. But the part where Paul starts wondering if maybe he's already dead . . . it is that odd, how much she knows.
What do you think about the blind woman who Paul sees in the elevator and later ends up with via Elizabeth Costello's doing. It's so strange - you don't know, like Paul, who she really is or if Costello's story about her is actually true. It is kind of fun that the reader is just as much in the dark as Paul is.
Hence why i think the book is nonsensical.
The more I think about it I don't like Paul. I'm to the part where Drago is staying with Paul. Paul has seen what affect he is having on the Jokics yet he keeps pushing. He says he wants to protect and help but so far he hasn't done either.
Yeah, I don't like Paul much either. Just like I didn't like the main male narrator/character in Disgrace (the only other Coetzee book I've read). They just aren't the kind of men I'd want to be around. :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by papayahed
I'm trying to think which character I like . . . I guess all of the Jokics are pretty interesting.
I just completed the book and, overall, found it unsatisfactory. Perhaps the critics who wrote so glowingly about it, oversold the book. While it undoubtedly has considerable merit, it is certainly not a modern classic in any sense.
The first thought that came to me about Slow Man was the thought of dislocation: under apartheid, South Africa's racist rulers forced various tribes to move from their homelands into what to them were alien lands. Also, various tribes would be split into halves with certain clans broken up and sent into differing areas. This racist program lasted for many decades until it was broken up by international action. After apartheid was ended, many white South Africans voluntarily dislocated themselves from that land. When they did, they took treasures with them that had been ill gotten from SA's many under-privileged and exploited tribes.
JM Coetzee, like other South Africans who went into voluntary exile. And this is what I believe forms the basis for ''Slow Man''.
In the story we read of a Paul Rayment (a dislocated Frenchman -- he says ''I was uprooted as a child'' on p 192) who suffers a near tragic accident. He is attended to be a displaced Croatian nurse (one dislocated by war),and endures the seemingly endless nagging of a ''Costello woman'' said to be from another location in Australia. Interestingly, all the characters are Catholic.
Very early in the book we are told that Rayment is in despair. The first thought in my mind was the old line from Dante's ''Inferno'' which was abandon all hope ye who enter here! Indeed, he immediately thinks as a crematorium {p 13} which is a hell on earth. As for life and its cruelties, ''we don't have a choice'' {p 7}. His painful state of being is ''real but surreal'' {p 9}. He is now a ''prisoner'' {p 54}. Then, he tries to find some measure of redemptive love by falling in love with Mrs Jokic.
Enter the ''Costello woman'' like a 'deus ex machina' who tells him ''it is not the end of the world''. {84} Through her machinations Rayment determines ''we are all free agents''. {105} Various changes of scene take place and a misunderstanding occurs when Rayment learns that certain valuable property may not have been stolen as he thought (in Dante's ''Inferno'', the main character met many counterfeiters in hell and Rayment believes he has found some in Adelaide). He asks: ''am I alive or dead'' {p 233} with Costello replying that she has ''many mansions''. {p 234} Those of you who know the New Testament know that this is a line that Jesus spoke about the heavenly Kingdom. Thus, it makes you wonder: is Costello a Beatrice like figure from Dante or a messianic figure?? She often speaks in seemingly meaningless riddles just like Jesus spoke in parables with few people really understanding what he meant. Beatrice sent the poet Virgil to guide Dante through hell. Costello sends various characters into Rayment's life supposedly to steer him into the proper path.
The story ends with a reconciliation among the characters but no real resolution to the problems they have. Thus, one is left with many questions but no real answers as to the author's meanings in this book.
So what makes this book so appealing to the critics who lauded it so much? In all honesty, I have not been able to figure it out.
Finished slow man today. It started off good but then it just kind of drove me a bit mad in the middle, and ended kinda alright. I didnt understand the point of Elizabeth at first but by the end of the book i liked her more than most of the characters. Her... how can i put it...Philosophy towards life was quite refreshing by the end of the book. I just didnt like Paul. I sympathized him but i dint love him as a character. I've voted Average in the poll. Kind of disapointed that this is what a nobel laureate wrote.
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Originally Posted by hellsapoppin
Does anyone think Costello failed in this respect? Even at the end Paul tells Marijana "I could live in your backyard", "I could have put up a shed". He still doesn't realize how not a good idea that is? Then refuses Costello's offer?
Is this the story of a guy that can't adapt? (He won't get a prothesis, won't ride the new bike) The more I think about it the more a waste a time this book was, I guess I expected some type of growth, learning, something.
yeah i know what you mean. But maybe that is the point. Maybe its to show that no mater how much you try, some people will never change...
This is the first time I've participated in this book club. Glad to see that I wasn't the only one who did not enjoy this book. After I finished it I was afraid I'd get on the boards to find glowing reviews.
I didn't enjoy this book very much. I didn't like the characters, found the way they spoke very uncomfortable and unrealistic. Who is the world was Elizabeth Costello? Why did she know everything about everybody? I was hoping to get more resolution on this. Reminded me of the movie, Stranger than Fiction, how she was orchestrating everything but we were never told how she knew everything.
Paul was a very pathetic character who seemed to say everything exactly opposite of what he actually thought. I kind of felt sorry for him, this older man with no family, wishing that he had created a different life for himself and was trying to create it now. But he didn't put up very good fights to try to get the things that he wanted.