A review by frogknitting
Foe by J.M. Coetzee

challenging tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

A strange little book — because of the way that my schedule and awful time management skills worked out, I had to cram it in before class yesterday, but I think reading it all in one sitting, in a sort of lucid state, was the best way to digest it. We discussed it for three straight hours and yet I still have ideas about it. The final part is a complete mystery to me,

a strange dreamscape that I read as Coetzee understanding his narrative as pulling him one way or the other, Friday always haunting it, Friday always impeded by something and his silence always a given in one way or the other. There is no version of Robinson Crusoe, indeed, where Friday is allowed to speak freely.

Coetzee's attitudes have definitely aged poorly in some aspects (although, are they Coetzee's or are they another? Are they just part of the story?), such as the strange submissiveness that takes over Susan's agency. I don't know. I enjoyed the book a lot and that's because it left me with a thousand questions.