| Abstract: | Although referring specifically to fiction writing in South Africa, J.M. Coetzee's comments in 'The novel today' (1988) elucidate the aesthetics of spatial construction which pertain in Daniel Defoe's 'Robinson Crusoe'. In this essay he distinguishes between a mode of writing which 'supplements' history by reproducing those oppositions related to class, race and gender conflict 'out of which history and the historical disciplines erect themselves', and another which 'rivals' history by 'occupying an autonomous place' and which 'operates in terms of its own procedures and issues'. When this distinction is applied to 'Robinson Crusoe' it becomes clear that this novel's representation of Crusoe's construction of space points to an activity which merely supplements history rather than rivalling it. In the present paper, the author departs from earlier readings of Coetzee's own novel, 'Life and times of Michael K' (1983), by arguing that this text is a rewriting of the Crusoe story, one in which the subject's encounter with space is represented as eventually leading to the creation of an autonomous place which rivals instead of supplementing history. By extension, then, the author contends that Michael K itself is an attempt on the part of Coetzee to produce a mode of writing which occupies such an autonomous place. Bibliogr., notes, ref. |
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