Robinson Crusoe - Shodhganga [PDF]

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Robinson Crusoe- The Foe? Robinson Crusoe is an all-time classic. When one refers to this novel, the reference is actually being made to the two parts in which the novel appeared. The first of these was titled The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner, and was published in 1719.

The sequel to this The Farther Adventures of

Robinson Crusoe was published within the same year. Both the parts go by the general name of Robinson Crusoe.

Robinson Crusoe is the archetypal novel or rather the

prototype of the novel per se. It is one of the pioneer novels in the history of English literature and Daniel Defoe along with Samuel Richardson and Henry Fielding, is considered one of the founding fathers of the novel. Robinson Crusoe is a product of the eighteenth-century. All its distinguishing features have heralded the trend for the novels of the following periods. Its form as well as its content have influenced many generations of novelists and continue to do so. J.M.Coetzee has undertaken a unique enterprise with regard to Robinson Crusoe. He has chosen to re-write Robinson Crusoe as it were, and the product of this endeavour is his novel Foe. Foe is the tale of the female castaway Susan Barton. She is shipwrecked and swims to safety. She reaches Cruso's island where she is rescued by Friday. It is necessary to note that in his novel, Coetzee has altered the spelling of Crusoe to Cruso. Also, unlike the Friday of Daniel Defoe's tale, here Friday has lost his tongue. About a year after Susan Barton's stay on the is/and, they are rescued and shipped to England. Cruso passes away shortly and Susan Barton becomes Friday's mistress. Coetzee's novel Life and Times of Michael K also has shades of Robinson Crusoe in it. The protagonist Michael K is forced out of the realm of civilization and lives

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in a pocket of time outside it. He ceases to be affected by the natural desires of the human being and lives like a veritable Adam on an abandoned farm.

His life on the

farm recalls the life of Robinson Crusoe on his island. The obvious question that arises is what are the concerns and preoccupations that guide Coetzee in his attempted re-writing of Robinson Crusoe? How do these enrich our intertextual reading of these two novels? These questions will be duly answered in the course of this chapter. The notion of ambivalence provides a methodical framework for the analysis of intertextuality. In this particular context of an intertextual reading of Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times of Michael K, and Foe, this notion provides the appropriate starting point. "Ambivalence" refers to the mapping of a literary text onto history and the tracing of history in a literary text. Here "history" is not referred to in the rather delimited sense of literafY history but in the larger context as a socio-political and cultural construct. At the primary level, the attempted re-writing of a work that is itself a part of history serves to foster a link between the past and the present. Why does Coetzee bridge this gap that exists between the distant past and the present? Does this indicate that the factors that were relevant for Daniel Defoe in the eighteenth-century also motivate Coetzee now in the present? In order to answer this question suitably, it is important to first understand the fact that there are two main aspects to it. occupied by Robinson

Cruso~

The first of these is the place of significance

in the history of English literature, and the second aspect

is the perspective that guides Coetzee in this enterprise of re-working on Robinson Crusoe, and re-writing ,it. Daniel Defoe's work is an pll-time classic and many writers

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have undertaken painstaking efforts to emulate and incorporate the unique features that it carried. Robinson Crusoe is a representative of the hitherto new kind of individualism that came to dominate the life of the common man in the contemporary period. This individualism veered away from the influence of the religious, the social and the political forces that were very active in the previous ages.

Marking a shift away from the

previous ages, the "realism" of the age of Daniel Defoe made the individual the epicentre of the world. This individual and his mundane activities captured the attention of the writers of this age and these were elevated to the status of being made the themes and the subjects of works of literature. If this same guideline is applied to the plot of Robinson Crusoe, one can easily state in a nutshell that the plot is about the life of a shipwrecked sailor on a lonely island and his struggle for survival. What occupies centrestage in the novel is the manner in which Robinson Crusoe devises contrivances to make his life comfortable on the lonely island. When perused carefully, one can even state that ironically what now seem as the chores of an individual's daily routine are accorded a special place of importance.

The plot does not carry any remarkable

features as such. Since Robinson Crusoe is the product of an age that marked a new beginning in terms of the unusual importance given to an individual, its popularity is unpara"eled. In addition to the above-mentioned factors, several other socio-political features were instrumental in the popularity of Robinson Crusoe. The eighteenth-century was the period that witnessed an unprecedented growth of Great Britain on the world scenario as a country that was to emerge as the most powerful one. The foundations of the British Empire were in a certain sense laid in this age. Evidence to this effect can

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be cited from the fact that numerous voyages of historic and political significance were undertaken during this period.

As stated by Arthur Humphreys, the "[ ... J South Sea

Company was launched in 1711, [ ... ] Commodore Anson circumnavigated the globe in 1740- 44, Byron's grandfather Commodore John Byron, in 1764, and Captain Wallis in 1766-8. Captain Cook made his great expeditions in 1768-71, 1772-75, and 1776-9." (25). Apart from the expeditions to the East, Britain also began to trade extensively with America and Europe. When viewed from this perspective, it would be very obvious that Robinson Crusoe is in fact an archetype of the true colonial Englishman. His adventure on the island served the colonial enterprise successfully. Robinson Crusoe's penchant for repeated overseas voyages symbolizes the typical colonial spirit that has been eulogized by readers the world over. If Robinson Crusoe's adventures are an epitome of the colonial spirit, the novel itself is the forerunner of the genre and is one of the fundamental texts of the canon.

If writers the world over have ceaselessly worked

towards re-enforcing the values and ideals glorified by Robinson Crusoe, why does J.M.Coetzee attempt to question these very values in his works Life and Times of Michael K and Foe. Before I can try to read the novels from this standpoint, it is worthwhile to first understand the standpoint from whic'l Coetzee is addressing this issue. He is a resident of South Africa, but he does not belong to this land.

He has a Dutch ancestry, his

forefathers having colonized the land in the previous ages. (The relevant details have been furnished in the previous chapters.) In this sense J.M.Coetzee is a European. Or rather he belongs to the class that has colonized Africa. More specifically, he is a direct descendant of people who have forcibly occupied the land of others.

Perhaps, his

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ancestor who first explored Africa, Jacobus Coetzee is another Robinson Crusoe. They (the Coetzees) cannot be counted among the indigenous population.

Hence

"I.M.Coetzee automatically belongs to the class that can be categorized as the mainstream one. By this qualification he ought to identify himself with the literature of the mainstream. But Coetzee does not do so. He seems to be working against the tide as it were by subjecting Robinson Crusoe to interrogation as it were.

Why does

Coetzee take up this daunting task when he can easily ally himself with this canonical text? The answer to this can be found in the position in which Coetzee finds himself. He finds himself in a peculiar situation.

Despite being a part of the African population,

Coetzee finds that he has failed to align himself completely with the natives. He has not given up his European lifestyle and has therefore not adopted the lifestyle of the locals. The local people- the natives are unwilling to accept him into his fold, while his moorings with Holland or rather Europe have been completely severed.

Coetzee finds that he

belongs to neither of these worlds. But at the same time he empathizes with the natives who have been exploited completely by the Europeans. This has found its expression in his fiction, as has been stated earlier.

Coetzee seems to carry the guilt of his

ancestors who have perpetrated atrocities on the natives. This manifests itself in the form wherein, although he belongs to the ruling class, he sympathizes with the ruled. By reworking Robinson Crusoe, Coetzee seems to bridge the great divide that has dominated his life. He is giving a voice to the marginalized that includes the colonized and women.

Coetzee has undertaken a reading of Robinson Crusoe from the

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perspective of the less privileged and has re-worked this classic from their standpoint. The three novels in question will be analyzed from this viewpoint. The novel Robinson Crusoe is replete with several instances that feed into the colonialist's perspective that has guided the production of this work. For instance, when Robinson Crusoe is pleasantly surprised to find barley growing on the island he remarks, that it was, "[ ... ] perfect green barley of the same kind as our European, nay, as our English barley." (74). Evidence to the colonial enterprise undertaken by Britain is cited when Robinson Crusoe states, "I could not tell what part of the world this might be, otherwise that I knew it must be part of America, [ ... ]. Besides, [ ... ], I consider'd that [ ... ], then it was the savage coast between Spanish country and Brasils [ ... ]." (97). J.M.Coetzee seems to make a mockery of these very features that have been exalted by Daniel Defoe.

In Daniel Defoe's novel Crusoe's manservant Friday can converse

fairly well in English but .in Coetzee's novel Foe, Friday is mute or rather he lacks a tongue. Despite repeated queries from the protagonist Susan Barton, she fails to elicit a suitable response from Cruso about how, when and why Friday lost his tongue. The language that Cruso teaches Friday or we may say the words that are taught to Friday are very limited. When Susan Barton questions Cruso about this he replies, "This is not England, we have no need of a great stock of words." (21). Cruso's behaviour towards Susan Barton was rather autocratic one could say. His conversation with Susan Barton was extremely restricted mainly due to his own reserved behaviour.

He barely

answered Susan Barton's innumerable queries. Even if she veered away a little from the norms laid down by Cruso she was severely reprimanded. Cruso was very angry with Susan Barton for making her own sandals, without waiting for him to do so. As a

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display of his anger, he flung the sandals out of the fence of his cottage on his island. The other important point of difference between the novel of Daniel Defoe and that of Coetzee lies in the character of Robinson Cruso(e). While the Crusoe of Defoe's novel is an industrious and enterprising man who cultivates the land successfully and even manages to invent all those items that ensure a comfortable life, the Cruso of Foe survives on a meagre diet of lettuce, fish and birds' eggs. The only task to which he applies himself is the creation of levels of terraces. At each level the terraces were protected by stonewalls painstakingly constructed by Cruso by carrying stones from elsewhere on the island. But perhaps the most striking difference is that these terraces were levelled and cleared but not cultivated because Cruso did not have any seed to plant. When Susan Barton questioned him about the obviously useless venture he was involved, Cruso replied that the terraces were in preparation for those that would come to the island bearing seed with them. Perhaps this can be considered as a metaphor for the futile nature of the colonial enterprise as a whole. Perhaps J.M.Coetzee is driving home the fact that the efforts of the pioneer colonizers have come to a naught. New life is possible only with the advent of the future generations. But even this proposition turns out to be an impossible one as demonstrated by the life of Cruso himself.

One can liken the life and adventures of

Robinson Cruso to the life of Jacobus Coetzee. Both of them made similar efforts to inhabit hitherto unknown lands. But theirs proved to be a wasted effort. They laid the foundation as it were for a new and interesting kind of life but their dream never materialized. Cruso was shipped to England but he passed away enroute. Jacobus Coetzee's descendants could not successfully mingle into the fabric of African life and

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continued to live incomplete lives.

Both Robinson Cruso and Jacobus Coetzee

represent the failed colonial enterprise.

In this context it is interesting to note that

Jacobus Coetzee undertook his expedition in the year 1760.

If Daniel Defoe has

invested in "Realism" by basing his tale on the life and adventures of Alexander Selkirk, J.M.Coetzee presents the contemporary version of "Realism" by alluding to the exploration adventure of his ancestor. This is a typical instance of the functioning of the notion of "ambivalence". Kristeva's notion can also be illustrated with reference to J.M.Coetzee's work Life and Times of Michael K.

Michael K is perhaps the most contemporary version of

Robinson Crusoe. In the case of Robinson Crusoe, it was destiny that was instrumental in confining him on a remote island. This holds good for the Cruso of Foe as well. But in the case of Michael K, it is not destiny but the socio-political developments that compel him to live off the land. It wouldn't be incorrect to state that Michael K becomes an island in himself amidst his own kind. Michael K also echoes Friday since he also carries a mutilation like the Friday of Foe. If Friday of Foe has lost his tongue, Michael K suffers from a harelip. The mutilation is not merely physical but functions at various levels and carries many implications to it. There is another important aspect in which Life and Times of Michael K differs from Robinson Crusoe. In Robinson Crusoe, there are hardly any female characters that carry significance in the novel. In Life and Times of Michael K, J.M.Coetzee does away with almost all male characters who are vital to Michael K's life. There is only a passing mention of Michael K's father.

Even when

Michael K's mother realizes that her life will soon end she pleads with Michael K to take her to the home where she had spent her childhood with her mother? If J.IV1.Coetzee is

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attempting to give a voice to the marginalized elements of Robinson Crusoe, then he has done so in Life and Times of Michael K. Michael K's life is dictated to a large extent by his mother. When Michael K is plagued by the question of what is the purpose of his life, the realization dawns upon him that he has been brought into this world to serve his mother. Due to his physical handicap, Michael K becomes an introvert and even takes up jobs that help him avoid any kind of interaction with people. When his ailing mother calls for him, he leaves the job and in order to fulfill her last wish, he goes into the countryside to cremate her ashes in what he believes is her home where she had spent her childhood. It is this turn of events that veers him away from the mainstream life. Prior to joining his mother Michael K worked as a gardener and was able to lead a decent life unaffected by the ravages of the social upheaval that had altered the fabric of the society around him for the worst. In contrast to Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times of Michael K is a deliberate effort to eulogize the life of Friday away from the overbearing master. In describing the life of Michael K, Coetzee is trying to drive home the point that Friday who is a metaphor for the colonized people, suffers from a permanent disability that hampers his efforts of leading a normal life. Additionally, this has also made him a dependent personality who is controlled by others. Michael K is unable to take charge of his life and his life goes awry due to his inability to fight the various odds that bog him down.

He has lost the willingness to live a normal life like the other

members of society.

Perhaps, in describing the life of Michael K, Coetzee seems to

pOint an accusing finger at the society and its people who are ruthless and apathetic and do not want to rehabilitate people like Michael K. The sad fact is that such people do not expect any special privileges. Society deprives them of all those rights that are

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to be provided to all beings as a compulsory obligation.

Else, matters take such a

serious turn that such individuals will even render society non-existent by refusing to follow its norms. This was the case of Michael K. In describing the life of Michael K, Coetzee presents the case of the underprivileged. In the broader context of the world Michael K is a member of the deprived class that has been colonized and even their most basic human rights denied to them.

In his own

country Michael K belongs to the lower strata of society in terms of the financial status. His mother spends her entire life serving people and earning barely enough to survive. To compound all these deprivations is Michael K's handicap of a cleft lip. In my opinion, J.M.Coetzee seems to make us aware of the fact that the exploitation of this class of people began centuries earlier when the Europeans appropriated other countries. More specifically, in the case of Michael K and in South Africa to where he belongs, it started perhaps with the coming of the early explorers like Jacobus Coetzee. This chasm has not been bridged till date.

What was first described by Daniel Defoe continues to

remain contemporary states J.M.Coetzee. The notion of ambivalence has been illustrated by a comparative or rather intertextual study of Robinson Crusoe, Foe and Life and Times of Michael K.

Daniel

Defoe's novel is considered the ultimate hallmark of the genre. From the perspective of colonialism, it is symbolic of a text that truly captures the colonial spirit of its times. From his individualistic viewpoint as a White South African, J.M.Coetzee has re-worked the novel in the form of Foe and Life and Times of Michael K.

By fostering a

relationship between this eighteenth-century masterpiece and his own contemporary

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works and highlighting the significance of Daniel Defoe's novel in our lives today, Coetzee has successfully proved the working of the concept of "ambivalence" The notion of imitation advocated by Plato and Socrates is vital to an intertextual reading of Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times ·of Michael K and Foe. Robinson Crusoe has spawned many works that have tried to imitate it in various ways. Foe is more than an imitation of Robinson Crusoe. J.M.Coetzee has re-written Daniel Defoe's work and has introduced various changes to the original. Coetzee takes off from the basic theme of Robinson Crusoe being marooned on his island, and his manservant Friday.

But

soon he is joined by another castaway Susan Barton. A year later the three of them are rescued by a "merchantman" named John Hobart. Cruso passes away on their way to England and Susan Barton who now passes as his widow is left to take care of Friday. From now on the plot of Foe takes a very different turn and Susan Barton seeks the help of Mr. Foe to narrate her tale. To Susan the reputation of Mr. Foe was that of "[ ... J the author who had heard many confessions and were reputed a very secret man." (48). Since Susan does not have any means at her disposal to earn her livelihood, Mr. Foe also takes up the responsibility of providing them with food and shelter.

Later,

when Mr. Foe cannot be traced by Susan, she and Friday take refuge in his house, subsisting on the carrots and the beans that are grown in the garden of the house. Suddenly, one day Susan is visited by her long lost daughter. Susan is convinced that the girl is not her daughter but now Mr. Foe who has returned to their midst tries to make her believe that she is indeed her daughter. Till the end of the narrative, the truth about the loss of Friday's tongue eludes Susan Barton and her tale remains untold. If Daniel Defoe's tale revolves primarily around Robinson Crusoe, J.M.Coetzee's tale

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centers around Susan Barton, Friday and Mr. Foe. Robinson Cruso is but reduced to the status of a minor character. The entire action takes place in England. The narrative of Robinson Crusoe vividly relates Crusoe's life on the island and his various voyages. In contrast to this, Foe discusses in detail the art of story telling and Susan Sarton's efforts at getting her tale written. Susan Barton and Mr. Foe discuss in great depth the loss of Friday's tongue and they also make sustained efforts to make available to him some means of communication by which he can express himself. The colonial enterprise that guides Robinson Crusoe of Daniel Defoe's novel is lacking in Coetzee's novel. Instead, the narrative describes the failed effort of a female castaway and her Negro slave to get her tale written. In a larger perspective this can be viewed as the failure of the marginalized class to get their voice heard. Both the woman, Susan and Friday belong to this class. But Susan's efforts to give a voice to Friday come to a naught. Even her efforts to put Friday on a ship to Africa and set him free fail.

She

continues to shoulder his burden. Towards the end of the narrative, all the problems seem to have been resolved. Susan Barton realizes that the author with whom she had been interacting was in fact Daniel Defoe. Everything gets mingled into the waters of the island. "This is a place where bodies are their own signs. It is the home of Friday." (157) The primary message that J.M.Coetzee is trying to convey by way of the narrative of Foe is that notwithstanding the time that has elapsed since the advent of Robinson Crusoe, things have remained unchanged as far as the relationship between the privileged and underprivileged goes.

Friday remained a faithful servant to Robinson

Crusoe and even sacrificed his life for his master. This loyalty has continued down the

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ages as demonstrated in Foe. The Friday of Foe does not display any kind of emotions as it were. Perhaps the only feelings he shows are those of subservience to Cruso first and later to Susan.

He never ever makes any attempt to escape away from his

mistress to his motherland. The unchanging nature of things is tellingly captured by the statement that describes the waters of the wrecked ship that appear at the end of the narrative to virtually wash away everything: "In the black space of this cabin the water is still and dead, the same water as yesterday, as last year, as three hundred years ago." (157). The notion of imitation is also applicable to a comparative reading of Robinson Crusoe and Life and Times of Michael K. In my opinion, Michael K resembles Friday of Robinson Crusoe and Foe.

By giving him the shades of Adam akin to Robinson

Crusoe, Coetzee recalls Defoe's novel but the similarity ends there. Michael K echoes the character of Friday.

Beginning from Robinson Crusoe through Life and Times of

Michael K to Foe, Friday loses his voice systematically. In Defoe's novel Friday devotes all his life unquestioningly to Crusoe. In Life and Times of Michael K, Michael K's life is impaired due to his cleft-lip. The culmination of this is the complete loss of speech of the Friday of Foe. Yet another feature that can be observed is that in Defoe's tale, we are furnished with details about Friday's family and how Friday came to be Crusoe's manservant. In Life and Times of Michael K, the only person who is related to Friday is his mother. Although he goes to Prince Albert (a place in the countryside), where his mother had reportedly spent her childhood, there is no mention of any relative whom lVIichael K attempts to meet. With the death of his mother, his only link with the society is severed.

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In Foe, Robinson Cruso never clearly states how and when Friday came to live with him. Like Susan Barton we are left to make vague conjectures about this. There are no details whatsoever about his family. It is only stated that Friday is a Negro. This seems a deliberate ploy on the part of J.M.Coetzee so as to make Friday a representative of Negroes in general.

It is important to remember that Friday was christened so by

Crusoe based on the day on which Crusoe happened to encounter him. Crusoe did not pay heed to details about his family and did not ask him his name. Perhaps the only quality about Friday that is praised in Robinson Crusoe is his complete devotion to his master. When Crusoe suggests that Friday return to his motherland, Friday appears to be deeply hurt and upset. He questions his master thus, "What you send Friday away for? Take, kill Friday, no send Friday away?"

(186).

On his part Crusoe is deeply

taken up by this demonstration of affection and devotion and resolves never to send Friday away. True to his word, Friday even lays down his life for his master. Michael K and the Friday of Foe are described as imbecile beings.

Due to his

disfigurement, Michael K avoids the company of people from early childhood. His early years are spent away from his mother in a remand home meant exclusively for variously afflicted children like him. Michael K is a solitary being and there is no mention of any friend he had or any other relative or acquaintance. His life begins with his mother and after her death he surrenders to the elements as it were. He is unable to understand the norms of society and hence carries the air of stupidity around him. When the news of his mother's death is broken to him he reacts in a rather peculiar manner. The doctor asks him whether he would like to make a phone call. "This was evidently a code for something, he did not know what. [ ... J People hovering over him made him nervous.

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He clasped his hands and stared hard at his feet. Was he expected to say something? He separated his hands and clasped them, over and over."

(41,42).

Later, when

Michael takes up residence in the abandoned farm, the Visagie grandson treats him as his servant and gets him to do menial jobs for him.

Michael K's life is governed by the

forces of society and he does make any wilful effort to lead his life on his own terms. One could state that Michael K is the true predecessor of the Friday of Foe. Despite being blessed with the power of speech, Michael K does not use it to his advantage. He allows his handicap to take precedence in his life and ends up being an aberrant and a vagabond. The most obvious next step to his life would be the Friday of Foe. In Foe, Friday is variously described. Susan Barton states that, "Friday has grown to be my shadow." (115). She also states, "He does not know what freedom is." (100). Friday's mute subservience compels Susan to think, "Had the cutting out of his tongue taught him eternal obedience, or at least the outward form of obedience, as gelding takes the fire out of a stallion?" (98).

In creating the character of the Friday of Foe,

Coetzee emphasizes the fact that the relationship between the master and the slave is still relevant today. The foundation of this relationship that is heavily biased in favour of the master was laid from the time of Robinson Crusoe. Coetzee underlines the fact that the Negroes have been systematically subjugated down the ages.

Robinson Crusoe

may have saved Friday from the clutches of his fellow cannibals, but as a token of gratitude, Friday willingly accepted a life of slavery. The benevolence of the White man is underscored repeatedly.

Daniel Defoe's narrative states that Friday is deeply

indebted to Crusoe since he is guided by the belief that Robinson Crusoe facilitated his access to a better life:

When Robinson Crusoe expresses his wish to visit Friday's

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island, Friday is pleased for he states that Crusoe will reform his people. "'You do great deal much good,' says he, 'you teach wild mans be good sober tame mans; you tell them know God, pray God, and live new life.'" (186). A similar sentiment is echoed by the Cruso of Foe. When Susan Barton expresses her sympathies for Friday's pitiable condition to Cruso, he in fact says that Friday is indeed lucky to have rlim as his master.

He states, "But perhaps it is the doing of

Providence that Friday finds himself on an island under a lenient master, rather than in Brazil, under the planter's lash, or in Africa, where the forests teem with cannibals. Perhaps it is for the best, though we do not see it so, that he should be here, and that I should be here, and now that you should be here." (24). In writing Life and Times of Michael K and Foe, J.M.Coetzee has imitated Robinson Crusoe. But as it has emerged from our study above, it is not a simplistic imitation but in fact a critique of Daniel Defoe's work. Coetzee has unveiled the colonial enterprise that has guided the writing of Daniel Defoe's work. Coetzee has illustrated how relevant the work is today and how its repercussions are more pronounced in the set-up of his country where the divide between the colonized and the colonized is the order of the day. Thus, imitation has supported an intertextual reading of Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times of Michael K and Foe. The concepts of metaphor, metonymy, paradigm and syntagm, which are the constituent elements of an intertextual relationship can be demonstrated with reference to a comparative reading of Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times of Michael K and Foe. A metaphorical relationship is necessarily a comparative one and hence the relationship between these three novels is a metaphorical one.

Such a relationship is also a

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metonymic one since there will be a perceived contiguity between the two elements that are being compared. This relationship can be further extended to a paradigmatic one since a text functions metaphorically due to a series of sUbstitutions and selections. Similarly a text can also be syntagmatically constructed due to combinations and additions, thereby creating a metonymic relationship.

As a consequence of these

relationships, four important factors emerge on the forefront that serve to govern these relationships.

These are comparison, contiguity, substitution and combination.

I will

now illustrate how each of these factors serves to forge an intertextual relationship between the three texts under consideration here. While detailing the working of the notions of ambivalence and imitation I have described how Coetzee's novels Life and Times of Michael K and Foe are in fact metaphors for the larger relationship between the people of the world who are divided into two major groups due to colonialism.

Both Michael K and Friday are in fact

metaphors for the citizens of the nations that had been once colonized but continue to suffer under its long-term negative fallouts.

More specifically, they are Negroes. In

Robinson Crusoe, they are cannibals. Even Friday belonged to this group of cannibals before he was rescued by Robinson Crusoe. It was Crusoe who veered him away from this abhorrent practice. In Life and Times of Michael K, Michael K's communication is hampered due to his physical disfigurement. Michael K is described as being too meek and submissive to prevent people from ruling his life.

In Foe, Friday is almost a

mechanical being. He is controlled by Susan Barton and he obeys all her commands faithfully. But Susan understands the fact behind Friday's fagade of a being without any emotions or sentiments.

"Tears came to my eyes, I am ashamed to say; [ ... ] and

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bitterly I began to recognize that it might not be mere dullness that kept him shut up in himself, nor the accident of the loss of his tongue, nor even an incapacity to distinguish speech from babbling, but a disdain for intercourse with me."

(98).

Thus, despite

lacking the ability of speech, Friday makes a very powerful expression of rlis feelings. Perhaps he is protesting against the fact that he has been forcibly brought to this land (England) that is very different from bis own country.

He was overpowered on the

orders of Susan Barton and bundled onto the ship. The first protest that he registered against Susan Barton was when he saw her on the ship to England. "But when he was brought aboard Friday would not meet my eye.

With sunken shoulders and bowed

head he awaited whatever was to befall him."

(41). Friday continued to behave

indifferently to Susan and sometimes she is even vexed with him. Friday's apathetic behaviour can also be interpreted as his revenge. He does not leave Susan even when she wants to set him free. He never ever makes any attempt to communicate with her. His listless attitude weighs down too heavily on her and she wants to escape.

But

Friday is unrelenting and Susan continues to shoulder his burden. Coetzee further underlines the differential treatment meted out to the colonized by drawing our attention to the names that have been given to them by the Europeans. Such individuals have lost their identity and individuality altogether and go by names such as Friday and Michael K. Just as Robinson Crusoe of Defoe's novel christened his slave Friday in a whimsical manner, so also Coetzee names his protagonist as Michael K. The "K" could be symbolic of any surname or no surname at all since the writer does not mention the name of Michael K's father. Perhaps Coetzee is trying to state that Michael K is "mother-born" just as Susan Barton in Foe states that her

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daughter is father born.

Susan Barton of

is shadowed by a girl who asserts

categorically that she is her daughter. Barton is unwilling to accept this. One day she dreams about this girl who questions her about her true parentage. Susan answers, "You are father-born. You have no mother. The pain you feel is the pain of lack, not the pain of loss." (91). In making this statement Coetzee seems to mock at the attitude of the colonizers. In Robinson Crusoe, Friday is a cannibal who is rescued by Robinson Crusoe. With the exception of Friday's father who happens to meet his son on the island, Friday's life is centered around his master.

It appears as if the character of

Friday has been introduced as a pretext to highlight the differences between the "savages" and the Englishmen as represented by Robinson Crusoe.

This has been

very clearly stated by J.M.Coetzee above in Foe. Thus, Coetzee has re-worked Daniel Defoe's classic and brought about a comparison between the characters.

This

comparative relationship is metaphorical in nature as shown above. The novels Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times of Michael K and Foe bear a relationship of contiguity.

The contiguous relationship begins with the order in which

they appeared on the literary scene. Robinson Crusoe was published in 1719 and the story of Foe describes a time soon after Cruso, Friday and Susan Barton are rescued from the desolate island

Life and Times of Michael K was published prior to Foe. One

can also identify a contiguous relationship with reference to the themes and the characters.

As stated earlier the novels of Coetzee here systematically trace the

degradation of the "Negro". metaphor as stated previously. ~nsures

But this terminology of the "Negro", functions as a In Robinson Crusoe, Crusoe's dogged didacticism

that Friday submits to him completely. Friday also begins to espouse the way

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of life of Crusoe. In the process, Friday is rendered a virtual non-entity who only serves to better the causes championed by Crusoe.

Crusoe is also a metaphor for the

Englishman or by extension a metaphor for colonialism.

Crusoe continued with this

enterprise on his island, and ensured that it flourished even in his absence.

Crusoe

declared himself the "governour" of his island and all the people on the island were to strictly abide by him. The colonial adventure has its roots in J.M.Coetzee's life also as his ancestor Jacobus Coetzee also made a colony of Africa. Jacobus Coetzee is the counterpart of Robinson Crusoe. In creating the character of Michael K, J.M.Coetzee has in fact described the descendant of Friday.

In Foe, Friday is re-invented once

again. After the passing away of his master Cruso, he is now controlled by his mistress Susan Barton.

If one were to trace the contiguous relationship it would extend from

Robinson Crusoe or Jacobus Coetzee to J.M.Coetzee and Susan Barton who is a White woman. On the other hand it would lead from the Friday of Robinson Crusoe, through Michael K to the Friday of Foe. This is also a circular kind of relationship since Foe is a re-writing of Robinson Crusoe.

The significance of this contiguous yet circular

relationship in this context has been discussed earlier. Substitution is also a means by which an intertextual relationship functions. Substitution aids the working of comparison and contiguity. How has J.M.Coetzee used this technique to his advantage in the writing of Life of Times of Michael K and Foe as re-workings of Robinson Crusoe?

Michael K recalls the Friday of Robinson Crusoe.

But the narrative as a whole seems very different from that of the narrative of Robinson Crusoe.

We need to identify the elements of Daniel Defoe's novel that have been

variously substituted by Coetzee.

In Robinson Crusoe, the protagonist Crusoe is

193

marooned on an island. Here, he puts his ingenuity to the best use and makes his life comfortable by creating all those items that are necessary for a life of comfort and abundance.

Crusoe declares himself the ruler of his island and enforces his wishes

with the power of an autocrat.

Crusoe saves Friday from the clutches of his fellow-

cannibals and enslaves him for life.

But Crusoe does this in a shrewd manner by

glorifying Christianity and the way of life of his country. When Friday tells Crusoe that in his land the elderly men or "oowocakee" go to the great mountains to pray to the Benamuckee (as they called their God), Crusoe explains to him that it is a "fraud". Crusoe tells him that, "[ ... ] the pretence of their old men going up the mountains to say

o to

their god Benamuckee was a cheat, and their bringing word from thence what he

had said was much more so; that if they met with any answer, or spake with anyone there, it must be with an evil spirit." (179). Thus, Crusoe went about changing Friday with a proselytizing zeal, by presenting Friday's religion in a bad light.

In doing so

Crusoe was guided by the belief that he was "[ ... ] now to be made an instrument under Providence to save the life, and, for ought I knew, the soul of a poor savage, and bring him to the true knowledge of religion, and of Christian doctrine [ ... ]."

(181).

Consequent to these efforts of Crusoe, for Friday, the memory of his previous life- his people, his language, the customs of his land were all obliterated forever from Friday's mind and heart. Friday willingly became Crusoe's slave. Coetzee uses the same theme to state that the foundation of the slavery of the Blacks was laid from here. But in life an.9-.IlDles of Michael

K,

Coetzee uses a series of

substitutive elements and different combinations of the same and other features to state his point.

In this novel of Coetzee, the protagonist is Michael K, a Black man. The

194

character of the master (Robinson Crusoe) is done away with. But this does not free Michael K from the shackles of slavery. Although at the peripheral level Michael K is a free man with no master to control him. But at the deeper level, Michael K continues to remain enslaved.

In Robinson Crusoe, Crusoe does not coerce Friday into slavery.

Instead he uses an approach of gentle persuasion to convince Friday into believing that Crusoe' way of life is the best. Friday is the master of his own will and desires. For Michael K the master is the establishment or the norms of society that rob him of his identity. From birth his communication is hampered because of his cleft lip. He is sidelined and does not go to school with the other normal children. Resignation to his fate was instilled in him from his early childhood. "Year after year Michael K sat on a blanket watching his mother polish other people's floors, learning to be quiet." (4). In Huis Norenius where he spent his childhood along with other such children, he learnt "[ ... ] the elements of reading, writing, counting, sweeping, scrubbing, bedmaking, dishwashing, basketweaving, woodwork and digging."

(4). Thus the fact that he

belonged to the class of the underprivileged was deeply ingrained in his heart and soul From early on he was trained in menial jobs that would help him survive in the world. Michael could never aspire to a better life beyond serving others. The harelip became the very bane of his life. People shunned him and he grew into a recluse Here Michael is in his own country land. But he is sidelined due to his deformity. In trying to fulfill his dying mother's last wish Michael K loses his job that was his only means of sustenance. The turbulent socio-political situation of his country aggravates his agony and he is even unable to satisfy his minimal human needs and desires.

Instead of being helped,

Michael K is exploited at every step. There are several attempts to steal his meagre

195

belongings. Even the tin containing his mother's ashes is not spared. The money that was saved by his mother all her life by sheer dint of her hard labour was forcibly snatched away by a soldier. People were too busy trying to protect themselves from the ravages of the war. Eventually when Michael was able to escape from all this into the lonely Visagie farmhouse, their grandson appeared on the scene and began to treat him as a servant. K gave him the slip and returned to the elements as it were. He survived in the mountains. By this time he was able to negate the wants of his body. He felt no hunger.

He lived in a different kind of world by rendering the world and its forces

ineffective. In this novel, J.M.Coetzee presents to us in a stark manner how society has always treated the underprivileged.

Robinson Crusoe was purported to have civilized the

savage Friday, but the seeds of slavery have spread their tentacles so powerfully that even in their own homeland, the Blacks continue to remain the deprived class. Although Coetzee does not explicitly mention the Wbites in the narrative of

.=.:...=--::;;;.:..;..;:;;

Times of Michael K, the various social classes continue to remain where they are. The affluent and the privileged continue to rule while the poor continue to serve them. The features of substitution, combination and deletion are used to a remarkable effect by J.M.Coetzee in the narrative of Foe.

The narrative of Foe has the same

setting as that of Robinson Crusoe. Unlike the tale of Daniel Defoe, here the death of Cruso takes place early on in the narrative. The rest of the tale revolves around Susan Barton, Friday and Mr. Foe.

Daniel Defoe's novel is a comprehensive account of

Robinson Crusoe's life on the island. Foe differs from Robinson Crusoe since in the former; Cruso is described as a lonely old man who had lost the zest for life.

The

196

relentless efforts of Crusoe of Daniel Defoe's novel to make his life as complete as possible are lacking in the Cruso of Foe.

The only food available to them is bitter

lettuce, fish and birds' eggs. Cruso lacked weapons, tools and seeds that would enable him to lead a better life. He would never divulge any proper details about how he came to the island, and his life before doing so. Susan Barton states, " But the stories he told me were so various, and so hard to reconcile one with another, that I was more and more driven to conclude age and isolation had taken their toll on his memory, and he no longer knew for sure what was truth, what fancy." (11,12). Thus the Cruso of Foe is a complete contrast to the Crusoe of Daniel Defoe's novel. Coetzee has invested this conventional hero with the attributes that have been associated with the Negroes.

The further description of Cruso recalls Michael K.

"Besides, as I later found, the desire to escape had dwindles within him. His heart was set on remaining to his dying day king of his tiny realm.

In truth it was [ ... ], but

indifference tc salvation, and habit, and the stubbornness of old age."

(13,14).

In

describing Cruso in this fashion, Coetzee is paving the way for Cruso's early demise and also for Susan Barton to take charge of Friday. This is at an elementary level in the immediate context of the novel. In Daniel Defoe's tale Crusoe is described at the end of the tale as leading a blissful life of "retirement". By spelling the death of Cruso, J.M.Coetzee seems to state that we need to move on beyond the likes of Robinson Crusoe. Crusoe has held its sway on the readers of the world for a period long enough. We need to move away from it and begin to look at it critically. This is the enterprise that Coetzee has applied himself to in Foe. By introducing the character of Mr. Foe, J.M.Coetzee makes a stringent criticism

197

of this writer (who is obviously Daniel Defoe).

Coetzee attempts to break the

complacence of the readers of the world. He calls upon them to break the stereotypes and look for newer protagonists who have heroic qualities. In Foe, J.M.Coetzee draws our attention to the art of writing and story-telling. When Susan Barton is insistent that her story be written by Mr. Foe, he explains to her that, "It is thus that we make up a book: loss, then quest, then recovery; beginning, then middle, then end." (117). These parts correspond to the various events of Susan Barton's life. The loss is that of her daughter for whom she searches in vain. This leads her to the island of Cruso, and in the meanwhile her daughter commences the search for her mother and eventually the mother and the daughter meet each other. unhappy with this plot.

But Susan is

She is keen that the adventure of her being marooned on

Cruso's island should be highlighted. She had even thought of the name of the book: 'The Female Castaway.

Being a True Account of a Year Spent on A Desert Island.

With Many Strange Circumstances Never Hitherto Related." (67). This suggests that Susan was still in awe of Cruso and wanted to have her life written on the same lines as that of his. But Mr. Foe tries to convince her that this would be an incomplete account. In stating so, ,J.M.Coetzee is in fact pointing out that we need to take a re-Iook into the high reputation that has been earned by Robinson Crusoe. But in the end we find that Mr. Foe is in fact Daniel Defoe.

As stated in the Introduction, in this context it is

worthwhile to note that Defoe had" [ ... J changed his name from Foe to Defoe in middle life) [ ... J." (5) Mr. Foe tells Susan Barton that, '''The island is not a story in itself,' [ ... J. 'We can bring it to life only by setting it within a larger story. By itself it is no better than a waterlogged boat drifting day after day in an empty ocean till one day, humbly and

198

without commotion, it sinks.'" (117). Further, Mr. Foe compares it to a loaf of bread that will sustain the readers when they are starved of reading, but will be rejected when there appear tastier foods. This implies that Robinson Crusoe was extremely popular in an age when the novel has just made its appearance on the literary horizon. But now, when there are better works available to the readers, they must read these in preference to Robinson Crusoe. In Foe, Coetzee has replaced the protagonist Crusoe with the White woman Susan Barton.

This could be described as part of his initiative of exposing the readers to

newer kinds of works. The introduction of Susan also has other implications. In my opinion, Coetzee is projecting his own individual feelings on Susan Barton. Coetzee appears to carry the guilt of colonialism. Within Africa, his ancestors forcibly occupied the land in the name of exploration and spread slavery that spelled the virtual doom of the Africans. The Friday of Foe is a typical representative of this race of people. Susan Barton the "Englishwoman" tries relentlessly to restore Friday's speech but fails. She begins to wonder whether is deliberately trying to behave in a manner that does not betray any emotions. "Was it possible for anyone, however benighted by a lifetime of dumb servitude, to be as stupid as Friday seemed? Could it be that somewhere within him he was laughing at my efforts to bring him nearer to a state of speech?" (146). Thus, the features of metaphor, metonymy, paradigm and syntagm serve to demonstrate the

intertextual

relationship

between

literary texts

by

employing

comparison, contiguity, substitution, deletion and combination. The functioning of these various elements has been illustrated with reference to Robinson Crusoe, Life and Time~ of Michael

IS and

Foe.

199

Martin Heidegger states that every work is an allegory.

Every literary work is

primarily an allegory and then functions as a symbol. In stating so, Heidegger implies that the literary work extends much beyond the words on the page. That is, a literary text shares a common subject with another work.

In this context, we can state that

Robinson Crusoe is an allegory of colonialism. The island that is occupied by Crusoe is turned into a veritable colony by him. He is the uncrowned ruler wielding powers that are unquestioned. Any opposition to this authority is severely suppressed. Since Foe is a re-writing of Robinson Crusoe, the subject and the theme are common.

Foe has characters that are symbolic of the class of people who have

encountered the bane of colonialism. The mute Friday is the most powerful symbol of the havoc wrecked by colonialism. Despite Susan Barton's repeated queries, Crusoe does not reveal any clear details about how Friday came to be his slave.

Cruso is

equally elusive about the loss of Friday's tongue. "Perhaps the slavers, who are Moors, hold the tongue to be a delicacy.' [ ... J 'Or perhaps they grew weary of listening to Friday's wails of grief, [ ... J. Perhaps they wanted to prevent him from ever telling his story: [ ... J. Perhaps they cut out the tongue of every cannibal they took, as a punishment.'"

(23).

By obscuring the past of Friday, J.M.Coetzee heightens the

miserable state of Friday. He is just a Negro. His actual name, his nationality and his family are lost to oblivion. In doing so, Coetzee seems to state that this is the manner in which the colonizers have treated their Black slaves.

The Blacks are only meant to

serve the Whites. This holds good for Friday of Foe. He diligently obeys Susan Barton and follows her everywhere like her shadow. Perhaps the only aspect in which he does not comply with her wishes is his refusal to master any form of communication. Friday

200 is not altogether impervious to Susan's communication with him. He is able to follow all that she asks him to do.

But he does not express any feelings or emotions.

Susan

convinces herself about why Friday does so. "Rather I wish to point to how unnatural a lot it is for a dog or any other creature to be kept from its kind; also to how the impulse of love, which urges us toward our own kind, perishes during confinement, or loses its way." (80,81). Friday of Robinson Crusoe and Foe are symbols of post-colonial Black citizens. Susan is the symbol of the post-colonial Whites. Martin Heidegger states that a literary work is primarily an allegory and then gets transformed into a symbol. This fact is borne out by these characters. colonialism.

As stated earlier, Robinson Crusoe is an allegory of

But when it undergoes a re-writing at the hands of J.M.Coetzee, it

becomes a symbol for the status of the citizens of the world who have been affected by the scourge of colonialism.

Thus, the kind of intertextuality described by Maliin

Heidegger is illustrated by Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times of Michael K and Foe. The dialogue is also an important element of intertextuality as discussed by Julia Kristeva.

Kristeva moves beyond the narrow confines of the dialogue as defined by

Socrates. Kristeva states that the dialogue is a means of arriving at the truth through discussion and argument. This dialogues takes place not only between individuals, but between literary texts as well.

Kristeva states that the themes of the dialogue are

"nonpersons, anonyms", which are overshadowed by the discourse that helps to compose it. This entails a continuous system of evaluation and rejection until the truth has been arrived at.

201

Coetzee's attempted re-writing of Robinson Crusoe is in fact the initiation of a dialogue with it.

Or it is a dialogue between the writers of these works.

evidence of this is the fact that Daniel Defoe is a character in Foe. name of Mr. Foe.

The best

He goes by the

By employing the character of Susan Barton who meets Mr. Foe,

Coetzee makes a critique of Daniel Defoe's works. Susan Barton asks Friday, "'[ ... J why did you not desire me, neither you nor your master? [ ... J Nevertheless, did Cruso in his way and do you in your way believe I came to claim dominion over you, and is that why you were wary of me? I ask these questions because they are the questions any reader of your story will ask."

(86).

Perhaps this is a pointer to the fact that

Robinson Crusoe, does not have any noteworthy female characters. Susan Barton is questioning Friday or indirectly questioning Daniel Defoe since Friday is I-lis creation. Foe carries explicit evidence that J.M.Coetzee is engaged in a dialogue with Daniel Defoe. Defoe tells Susan Barton, '''In a life of writing books, I have often, believe me, been lost in the maze of doubting. The trick I have learned is to plant a sign or marker in the ground where I stand, so that in my future wanderings I shall have something to return to, and not get worse lost than I am. [ ... J; the more often I corne back to the mark

[ ... J, the more certainly I know I am lost, yet the more I am heartened too, to have found my way back.' " (135, 136). Daniel Defoe has indeed returned to his beginnings in the form of Mr. Foe of Foe. Although the writers wish to highlight the pathetic state of the individuals who have borne the brunt of colonialism or have helped to perpetrate it, these characters are nonentities in the larger scheme of things of the writers. More importance is bestowed on the means rather than the end. They are used as mere pretexts by the writers to give

202 an expression to their thoughts. This is evident in Foe where there is no clear resolution about the attempts to restore Friday's speech. Towards the end of the narrative Susan Barton finds herself in the fateful waters where the ship had been wrecked. encounters the body of Friday and when she tries to listen to

~lim

She

she finds that she can

"[ ... ] begin to hear the faintest faraway roar: [ ... J, the roar of waves in a seashell; [ ... ], the whine of the wind and the cry of a bird. [ ... ] From his mouth, without a breath, issue the sounds of the island." (154). Further on Barton finds that she has come to Friday's home. This is a place where the bodies themselves convey all the meaning. The words of language seem to virtually get dissolved.

This indicates that Friday's identity is

determined solely by his body. Notwithstanding Susan Barton's dogged determination to restore Friday's capacity of speech, he would remain a Negro without a tongue. Thus, the dialogue between J.M.Coetzee and Daniel Defoe that is purportedly focused on Friday is in fact a critique of the works of the latter. The dialogue has provided a suitable ground for an intertextual study of the works of Defoe and Coetzee. Julia Kristeva propounded the theory of the dialogue as a means of intertextuality. Here, the dialogue ensues between two literary texts. Taking off from this concept of the Socratic dialogue is Mikhail Bakhtin's theory of dialogism.

Bakhtin states that a

literary text gains its meaning by the dialogue that takes place between its various constitutional elements viz. the language of the literary text, its author and its readers. The additional factors that impinge on this are temporality and the socio-political, historical and cultural forces that are at work in the contemporary period. How does this concept apply to a reading of Robinson Crusoe?

203

To answer this question, it is necessary to place it in the larger perspective of the period during which it was written. Robinson Crusoe was one of the pioneering novels and it was written during an age that abided by the tenets of Realism. The most striking feature of Realism was that it presented the true state of things as they were.

The

mundane was considered significant and discussed comprehensively. This holds good for Robinson Crusoe.

The extraordinary interest that was generated in Robinson

Crusoe was due to the fact that it carried extensive details about how Crusoe went about his life on the island. His daily chores, his habitation, his means of sustenance and also his deepest feelings as experienced during the time of his various voyages, are all described explicitly. "[ ... ], I fill'd a large square case bottle with water, and set it upon my table in reach of my bed; [ ... ]; then I got me a piece of the goat's flesh, and broil'd it on the coals, but could eat very little; I [ ... J was very weak, and very sad and heavy-hearted in the sense of my miserable condition; [ ... J. As I sat here, some such thoughts as these occurred to me. What is this earth and sea of which I have seen so much? [ ... J. Whence are we?" (84). This reveals the carefully crafted content of the no·;el. The Intricate details do succeed in creating an air of verisimilitude. In keeping with the traditions of his time, in the Preface to the novel, Daniel Defoe stakes his claim to the fact that the novel is a true tale and not a fictional one. "The editor believes the thing to be a just history of fact, neither is there any appearance of f ICt·Ion .In .It: [ ....J"

(16). Another striking feature of the novel is the complete

subservience of the plot to the narrative. Here, one cannot really identify a plot in the true sense of the term. The entire novel showcases the voyages of the indefatigable adventurer that Robinson Crusoe was.

This points to the fact that the novel is an

204 autobiographical memoir. The features of Robinson Crusoe that have been discussed now bear testimony to the fact that it is indeed a "realist" novel, in keeping with the literary trends of its contemporary times. Mikhail Bakhtin also identified temporality and the socio-political, historical and cultural forces as powerful factors that influence the novel.

The extra-literary factors

that affect the literary text can be of two kinds- those of the period when the work is produced and those that are prevalent when the novel is being read. It is the causative element of temporality that brings about the vital difference between these two sets of features.

Robinson Crusoe is a representative of the literary movement of Realism.

Realism in turn is an outcome of the various changes that were taking place in the England of the eighteenth-century.

Capitalism was the key factor that catalyzed the

major transition in the social life. It triggered the birth and growth of colonialism. As opposed to the general perspective of things, the particular now gained great significance. The individual now become the centre of things. The individual enterprise was the order of the day. Robinson Crusoe captured the true spirit of the age. This very same novel gains added and different connotations when read today. To J.M.Coetzee who has descended from one of the early explorers of Africa, Robinson~usoe

is a symbol of colonialism. He has chosen to re-work it. In the texts

authored by Coetzee, the characters of Defoe's novel have been altered. It appears as if Michael K and the Friday of Foe are the descendants of Friday of Robinson Crusoe. After coming in contact with Robinson Crusoe, Friday severed all ties with his own kith and kin. Michael K suffers a deep-rooted sense of alienation in his own country, while in Foe; Friday has been uprooted from his native soil and becomes an empty body

205

without a soul as it were. Thus, the features of dialogism listed by Mikhail Bakhtin help to understand Robinson Crusoe in a better light. Let us examine how dialogism is applicable to a reading of Life and Times of Michael

K. When one undertakes a reading of this novel without comparing it with Robinson Crusoe, it is a tale of an underprivileged Black caught in the aftermath of the social turmoil of South Africa.

It traces his life from his birth to its gradual degradation. At

every stage of his life society rudely snatched away each chance of leading a respectable life. He couldn't even satisfy his hunger or have proper clothes to protect his frail body against the vagaries of the weather. himself up to the elements as it were. shelter.

In sheer protest, Michael K gave

He stopped all attempts to search for food or

His body could no longer resist and it broke down.

He was arrested and

charged with "[ ... J leaving his magisterial district without authorization, not being in possession of an identification document, infringing the curfew, and being drunk and disorderly.

Attributing his debilitation and incoherence to alcohol poisoning, they

permitted him to stay in the yard [ ... J." (96,97). Coetzee uses powerful language to capture the misery of the helpless Michael K. The writer employs the technique of the third person narration. affect of the tale.

It brings in an acute sense of helplessness in the hearts and the

minds of the readers.

Our heart goes out to this victim of depravation and we are

compelled to find the wrongdoer. endeavour.

This heightens the

When we do so, Coetzee has succeeded in his

He forces us to think about the origins of this social imbalance. We go

back in time and find its roots in Robinson Crusoe. As if to deliberately remind us about this novel, J.M.Coetzee places Michael K on a lonely farm where he begins to live off

206

the land. This imager)' is a striking one and reminds us easily about the Adamic life of Robinson Crusoe on his island. Moving further on the scale of temporality, we find that the character of Friday in J.M.Coetzee's later novel

takes off from Michael K. Our

comparison of Michael K with Friday is not a wrong one. Thus, this brings together all the features of dialogism discussed by Bakhtin.

The writer engages in an active

dialogue with the characters and the readers, he forces the readers to move back and forth in time and bring into perspective previous and later texts, as also the contemporary extra-literary features into consideration. This exercise has brought out the true meaning of the novel and also simultaneously catered to an intertextual reading. Dialogism as propounded by Mikhail Bakhtin has facilitated an intertextual and close reading of Robinson Crusoe and Life and Times of Michael K as seen above. It can also be applied to a reading of Foe.

The techniques that have been used by

J.M.Coetzee in the writing of Life and Times o[Michael K have been duplicated in the writing of Foe. Since Foe is a re-writing of Robinson Crusoe, Coetzee is throwing a challenge to the readers to rethink about a work that was very highly appreciated. He makes us wonder whether the accolades heaped on Robinson Crusoe were well deserved. Coetzee's work has made the readers undergo not merely an introspection but a retrospection as well. Readers the world over have appreciated Defoe's text for what it states peripherally. Nevertheless Foe makes us think beyond the words on the page.

Coetzee has

deliberately taken the attention away from Cruso and made Friday the subject of the work. In my opinion, it is Friday who is the central character and not Susan Barton.

207 This is because although Friday is mute, the entire action of the novel revolves around him. Even Susan Barton spends her life trying to get Friday to communicate and get his tale written by Mr. Foe. She states, "I choose rather to tell of the island, of myself and Cruso and Friday and of what we three did there: [ ... ]." (131). Another remark that is a pointer to the readers is Barton's categorical assertion to Mr. Foe. She emphasizes the fact that she does wish to narrate her story. "I choose not to tell it because to no one, not even to you, do I owe proof that I am a substantial being with a substantial history in the world."

(131). This statement is a contrast to Daniel Defoe's assertion in the

Preface to Robinson Crusoe, that his tale is an authentic one. By drawing our attention to the fictional nature of writing, Coetzee has discredited Defoe's claim.

Further, this

can also be taken as a challenge to the very premise of Realism. Notwithstanding the fact that the writers who abided by realism created authentic tales, ultimately it is a figment of imagination states J.M.Coetzee.

Perhaps this is a reason why he has not

given a well-rounded ending like the traditional novel, to Foe.

Instead the entire

narrative is devoted to the critique of the process of writing. Towards the end of the narrative, the problems remain unsolved and everything is subsumed to an endless stream in which language seems to get dissolved. Thus Coetzee seems to assert that it is not "real" but insubstantial. The concept of intertextuality is a hypothetical one and it provides the scope for undertaking a better comparative study of two or more texts. Intertextuality has as its founding basis the concept of an intertext.

As stated earlier, the intertext is an

imaginary construct. Its existence is supported by the notion of "illusion" proposed by Wolfgang Iser. "Illusion" refers to the expectations aroused in the reader while reading

208 a literary work.

The onset of these expectations is guided by the readers' own

repertoire of the knowledge of previous texts clubbed with allusions to familiar social, cultural and historical contexts. Consequently, the readers begin to invariably compare this hitherto new text with the older ones.

This leads to the creation of an intertext,

whose existence can be described as an intermediary one. When we undertake a study of Life and Times of Michael K, we find that it hardly resembles Robinson Crusoe. Unlike the adventurer Robinson Crusoe, Michael K is an unfortunate being who is afflicted from birth. Misfortune dogs him at every step of his life. He is poor, hardly well educated and comes from a family that has nothing to boast about. In fact, there is no mention of his father. In his family it was the women who kept the hearth going. Michael K's mother Anna K had a difficult childhood. "Her father was not steady; there was a problem with drinking; and in her early years they had moved from one farm to another.

Her mother had done laundry and worked in the

various kitchens; Anna had helped her. [ ... ] After the birth of her own first child she had come to Cape Town. There was a second child from another father, then a third one who died, then Michael." (9, 10). In contrast to this is the family of Robinson Crusoe. The novel opens with Crusoe introducing himself as belonging to " [ ... ] a good family, tho' not of that country, my father being a foreigner of Bremen [ ... ].

He [ ... ] had married my mother, whose

relations were named Robinson, a very good family in that country [ ... ]." (17). Since Crusoe hailed from an affluent family, his father ensured that the best education was made available to his son.

"My father, who was very ancient, had given me a

competent share of .Iearning, as far as house-education and a country free-school

209 generally goes, and designed me for the law; but I would be satisfied with nothing but going to sea, [ ... J.

My father, a wise and grave man, gave me serious and excellent

counsel against what he foresaw was my design." (17). Thus, Crusoe could have very easily led a life of pleasure and comfort. It was the indomitable spirit of adventure in him that goaded him on. Robinson Crusoe abided by the call of his heart and did not really regret the consequences that followed.

In an alien land, on a lonely island, he

found his peace, and his success. Robinson Crusoe took charge of his life and was dictated by his own will. He was the master of his destiny. At the end of his life Crusoe was a contented man, with his quest for adventure having been satiated by his numerous eventful voyages. "And here, [ ... J, I am preparing for a longer journey than all these, having liv'd 72 years, a life of infinite variety, and learn'd sufficiently to know the value of retirement, and the blessing of ending our days in peace." (466). Thus we notice that Robinson Crusoe is the master of his destiny, while Michael K is a virtual slave to his destiny. This brings up the similarity between Michael K and Friday of Robinson Crusoe. The commonality is their race.

Both are Negroes.

Friday had

been captured by rlis fellow cannibals and they were to feast on him when Robinson Crusoe intervened and saved him. Hence Friday dedicated his life to Robinson Crusoe and became his servant for life.

But Michael K is not altogether like Friday.

Unlike

Friday who is forced to leave his motherland, Michael K suffers humiliation and torment in his own country and at the hands of his fellow-countrymen.

K carries shades of

Robinson Crusoe. When Michael decides to make the Visagie farm his home, he looks around himself and tries to live off the land as it were by making use of the natural resources available to.him there. Initially he hunted a goat on the farm, but found it too

210

much to be consumed by a single person. Now, he began to live on birds that he killed with his catapult. While burying his mother's ashes, the impulse to cultivate the land arose in him. He made a beginning with a few seeds that he had picked up carelessly.

"[ ... J;

now, in a matter of weeks, he found his waking life bound tightly to the patch of

earth he had begun to cultivate and the seeds he had planted there. There were times,

[... J,

when a fit of exultation would pass throwgh him at the thought that he, alone and

unknown, was making this deserted farm bloom." (81, 82). This satisfaction of Michael K echoes the feelings of Robinson Crusoe when he was on his island. "My island was now peopled, [ ... J; and it was a merry reflection which I frequently made, how like a king I look'd. [ ... J, the whole country was my own meer property; so that I had an undoubted right of dominion. 2dly, my people were perfectly subjected: I was absolute lord and lawgiver; they all owed their lives to me, and were ready to lay down their lives, [ ... J, for me." (197).

But the sad fact about K's life was

that his happiness was short-lived and soon the Visagie grandson arrived on the farm and began to dominate over him. To avoid this K was forced to abandon his stay on the farm and take shelter in the mountains from where he eventually became a vagabond. Eventually, Michael was reduced to a pitiable state where the needs of his body began to torment him and he began to neglect them. Unable to take any more suffering, his body soon broke down and his spirit was anyway too weak to fight the forces that were deterrent to his very existence as it were. The character of Michael K has the attributes of Robinson Crusoe and Friday. But Michael K was a failure in life because he was exploited by his own countrymen. On the other hand. Robinson Crusoe earned wealth

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and fame by undertaking voyages to new lands. Friday had left behind his country to serve Crusoe. Coetzee re-works the tale of Robinson Crusoe in Foe. But unlike the original tale, Robinson Crusoe is a minor character who does not essay any major role in the lives of Friday or Susan Barton. In Robinson Crusoe, Friday is a cannibal who willingly devotes his life to Crusoe. But at the same time he is an individual in his own right. He advises his master on all those issues in which he is competent to do so. When Crusoe decides to visit Friday's island to rescue his countrymen, Friday advises him against it. Friday points out rightly that there would be a shortage of food if more people were to come onto the island. In this context Crusoe states, "His caution was so seasonable, [ ... ] and his advice was so good, that I could not be very well pleased with his proposal, as well as I was satisfied with his fidelity."

(201).

Also, Friday is clever and diligent and

successfully executes all the work allocated to him by Crusoe. He was instrumental in helping Crusoe wield his authority judiciously and fruitfully. The Friday of Foe is a contrast to this sensible and faithful Friday of Robinson Crusoe. Susan Barton's only relationship with Friday is that he had rescued her in a certain sense. He had carried her to Cruso's encampment when she had managed to swim to the shore of Cruso's island, after having been cast away by the crew of the ship in which she was sailing. Since he was Cruso's servant, he had served her also. After Cruso's demise she automatically became his caretaker in a land that was alien to him (England). She nurtured Friday affectionately. "'A woman may bear a child she does not want, and rear it without loving it, yet be ready to defend it with her life. Thus it has become, in a manner pf speaking, between Friday and myself.''' (111). But what vexes

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Susan Barton is that he never ever shows any kind of emotion towards anybody. She tells him that she is wasting her life on him. He may have been Cruso's servant but now Friday became a responsibility that became too difficult for Susan Barton to handle. Sometimes she feels very lonely and miserable.

She wishes that Friday would

reciprocate her love. But he is unmoved. The loss of Friday's tongue is a mystery that Susan Barton is unable to resolve till the end. Her dogged and innovative efforts to find some means to understand Friday's thoughts and get him to communicate, yield no results. Barton is exasperated and says, "He utters himself only in music and dancing, which are to speech as cries and shouts are to words. There are times when I ask whether in his earlier life he had the slightest mastery of language, whether he knows what kind of thing language is.' "(142). Barton's problems are multiplied when Friday gets into his "mopes". given this nomenclature to Friday's transitory aberrant behaviour.

Cruso had

During these

"mopes", Friday would become listless and disappear to an obscure part of the island. He would return later as if nothing had happened. Now Susan Barton was compelled to endure Friday's mopes. He moves about the house as if he had wanted to escape, but too meek to do so. He does not heed to Susan Barton's calls, but she continues with her soliloquies in front of him with the earnest hope that he will respond.

But Friday

continues to inhabit his own mute world oblivious to the influence of Susan Barton or Mr. Foe. The Friday of

recalls Michael K. If the "mopes" of Friday are only a transient

phase in Friday's life, it appears as if Michael K is forever in a state of "mopes". In Foe, it is unclear about why Friday behaves in this odd manner. But in the case of Michael

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K, he is pushed to the brink as it were. He makes several attempts to integrate himself into the mainstream of life, but each time he is rebuffed. Michael K has an impaired lip that makes communication difficult for him.

Sadly, no one ever tries to correct this

defect. He is ridiculed for this. Michael K's mother Anna K treated her child differently. "Because their smiles and whispers hurt her, she kept it away from other children." (4). The Friday of FOE1 appears to be a later-day version of Michael K. K is reduced to this pitiable state due to the exploitation and negligence of his fellow men. If Friday is a reincarnation of Michael K, then Susan Barton is undertaking penitence on behalf of all those people who have wronged Friday. As stated earlier, Robinson Crusoe is one of the first novels that made its presence felt on the literary horizon. It marked the growth of the genre of the novel. The birth and the growth of the genre are determined by the contemporary situation.

It has been

discussed how the variolJs social, political, cultural, historical and econornic factors contributed to the growth of the novel. Mikhail Bakhtin devotes attention exclusively to the novel in his theories.

In his opinion the novel deserves a special place since it

provides a common platform for different discourses and the various social languages. This empowers it to influence and change the cultural history of the contemporary times. The most striking feature of Bakhtin's views is the distinction made between the "novel" and the feature of "novelness". He believes that the history of the novel per se is rooted in literary history, while the history of novelness is rooted in the human consciousness. An intertextual study is possible by using the framework of the genre and also using 8akhtin's views on the significance of the novel.

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8akhtin states that the novel has the potential to alter entire cultural systems. Robinson Crusoe is a case in point. The best example of its influence is Life and Times of Michael K. The manner in which J.M.Coetzee describes the life of Michael K is a reminder of Robinson Crusoe. If Daniel Defoe proclaimed that his tale was a true one, Coetzee does not do so. Instead, his tale is told so vividly, that it appears as if the life of Michael K is indeed visible to us. "In the early hours of the morning the wind rose and heavy rain began to fall, beating through the broken windows of the Cote d'Azur, the Cote d'Or, the Copacabana, as well as of the Egremont and the Malibu Heights, which had hitherto offered a sheltered prospect [ ... ] around the Cape of Good Hope, [ ... ]." (16). The intricate details that are narrated do present an authentic picture of the South African countryside.

The writer also reveals to the readers the deepest feelings of

Michael and his mother. "Lying in bed in her airless room through the winter afternoons

[... J, she dreamed of escaping from the careless violence, the packed buses, the food queues, arrogant shopkeepers, thieves and beggars, sirens in the night, the curfew, the cold and wet, and returning to a countryside where, [ ... ], she would atleast die under blue skies." (10). Life and Times of Michael K is an example of how Robinson Crusoe is still emulated today. Foe marks a contrast from this since by re-working Robinson Crusoe, Coetzee is attempting to veer the readers away from it. Coetzee seems to question the efficacy of Daniel Defoe's narrative. Coetzee is in fact articulating a very important cultural change since Robinson Crusoe has been an intrinsic part of the literary culture.

Foe is a

decisive effort to break the tradition of blindly appreciating Robinson Crusoe and overlooking its flaws .. This enterprise of Coetzee is a novel one and the work Foe is an

215 epitome of the novelness that is an inimitable feature of Coetzee's literary acumen. If Robinson Crusoe was the embodiment of novelness during its contemporary period, Foe is a contender for this position today.

Thus, Bakhtin's views on the novel, and

novelness have served to undertake an intertextual reading of Robinson Crusoe and the novels of J.M.Coetzee. Ross Chambers explores the theory of intertextuality from the perspective of the literary canon. More specifically, Ross Chambers attempts a critique of the "intertext". The intertext is a differential entity that gains its identity from the fact that it carries features of two or more literary texts. Consequently, its identity is distinct from that of the canonical texts. The irony that is at work here is that the intertext has the texts from the canon as its founding basis but it negates them.

The irony is carried further

because the readers of the texts of the canon attempt to delineate the characteristics of this intertext. This feature of the canon and the intertext holds good for an intertextual reading of Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times of lVIichael K and

It goes without

saying that Robinson Crusoe is the work of one of the novelist who is credited with the art of inventing the novelistic form. Coetzee has abided by the tenets of the canon in the writing of Life and Times of Michael K.

In this work Coetzee has replicated the techniques employed by Daniel

Defoe in the writing of Robinson Crusoe. interrogated the novel as also the writer. character in

But in the writing of Foe, Coetzee has Mr. Foe (who is in fact Daniel Defoe) is a

and the character of Susan Barton defends his work.

Mr. Foe

contradicts the views of Daniel Defoe as stated in Robinson Crusoe. Susan wants to have her story written on the lines of that of the original Robinson Crusoe. But Mr. Foe

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is unwilling. She asserts, "You call it an episode, but I call it a story in its own right. [ ... ].

Taken in all, it is a narrative with a beginning and an end, [ ... ], lacking only a

substantial and varied middle, [ ... ]. Now you propose to reduce the island to an episode [ ... ]. This too I reject." (121). Coetzee questions the validity of Daniel Defoe's work and the strategies used by him.

Coetzee states that the texts of the canon must be

amenable to change. Perhaps for Coetzee the ideal literary text needs to incorporate the features of Robinson Crusoe, Life and Times of Michael K, and also take into consideration the suggestions offered in Foe. Thus, an interlinking of the texts of the canon and the intertext has revealed newer insights into the workings of the theory of intertextuality. Ann Jefferson discovers a new insight about intertextuality that has been undiscovered by the previous theoreticians.

Jefferson fosters a link between the

autobiography and the novel. Jefferson states that the novel is not altogether fictional. It is necessarily rooted in reality and hence shades of the writer's own life can be discerned in it. Life and Times of Michael K and Foe are not autobiographical in the strict sense of the term. But they do offer insights into the preoccupations of Coetzee. Michael K is an objective and comprehensive account of the traumatic struggle of a poor, unfortunate Black man.

Coetzee's narrative seeks to not merely draw our

sympathy but to ask in a forthright manner as to who is to be blamed for this sorry state of the Blacks. In posing this question, Coetzee seems to look inwards- He is a White South African who sympathizes with the lot of the Blacks. Perhaps he considers himself or his ancestors responsible for this. The least he can do is to draw the attention of the world to this.

He lend.s a more acute shade to the misery of the Blacks by re-writing

217 Robinson Crusoe with a mute Friday and a female protagonist (Susan Barton, a White woman), who champions his cause. As a mark of his revenge Coetzee sidelines Cruso in his work- Cruso passes away in the early part of the narrative. Mr. Foe also helps Susan Barton in her attempts to rehabilitate Friday.

Mr. Foe echoes the feelings of

Coetzee when he convinces Susan Barton that it is not easy to liberate Friday. "We deplore the barbarism of whoever maimed him, yet have we, his later masters, not reason to be secretly grateful? For as long as he is dumb we can tell ourselves his desires are dark to us, and continue to use him as we wish." (148). At the end of the narrative, Friday continues to remain mute. His neck bears a scar that has been left either by a chain or a rope. This is an indication that the subjugation of Friday has been achieved in totality. Initially he was deprived of his voice and now, he pays with his life. A slow stream makes its way out of Friday's mouth. It is monotonous and meaningless but it is all encompassing, "[ ... J, it runs northward and southward to the ends of the earth." (157). This is perhaps symbolic of the fact that if the oppressed were to open their mouths to assert themselves, everything will be wiped out. Coetzee is making an attempt to break the complacence of the world towards the exploited and the deprived classes. We must all awaken and acknowledge their presence and their power. Thus, in these two novels J.M.Coetzee has projected his own feelings and extended them to the larger canvas of the world. His works are inspired by reality. Michael Riffaterre brings in an interesting classification about intertextuality. Riffaterre distinguishes between "aleatory" and "obligatory" intertextuality.

"Aleatory"

intertextuality allows the reader the freedom to view the text from the perspective of one

218

or more familiar texts. "Obligatory" intertextuality begins with the presupposition of the existence of a common "hypogrammatic" origin.

In the intertextual study undertaken

here, the latter kind of intertextuality is at work since J.M.Coetzee's novels here are reworkings of Robinson Crusoe. Here, the three novels do not impinge on each other. Temporality has served to make the later texts as re-workings of the earlier ones.