Coetzee "Shame" Multiple Themes

In2003, John Maxwell Coetzee won the Nobel Prize. As a Netherlands-born whiteauthor, he fell into a plight of getting cultural identity from his early life, and was botheredby a sense of mental anguish of otherness resulting from his marginal identity. He tries toescape from South Africa, but he can’t. This article includes many themes such as thenation, history, ecology, ethics, and ethical issues. Based on the close reading, this thesisconsists of five parts.The introduction: A brief introduction of the writer’s complex background, includingthe differences between his family, language and people around.All those directlyinfluenced his thoughts in the future. And then, this paper summarizes the study on thewriter and his works done by academic circles at home and abroad.Chapter Ⅰ: The racial conflicts exist in new South Africa. The history of modernSouth Africa is closely connected with racial issues, and cannot be isolated from each other.This part is mainly combined the history of South Africa with the present situation. It baseson post-colonial theory, and discussed the conversion of roles between the Blacks andWhites. Furthermore, it concerns the living survival of all humanity.Chapter Ⅱ: Animal care in Ecological holism Sight. J· M·Coetzee is an absolutevegetarian and animal lovers, his actions are aimed at improving the plight of animals,especially improving farm animals (animals for human consumption). This part putts theperspective of animal life as an entry point, and focuses on the status of animal as well asthe compassion the writers reflected on animal. According to the actions of Lurie andLucy, the text shows that the animal is an important part of the biological chain.Metaphor exists between animals and human.Chapter Ⅲ: Gender identity confusion. The text is the basic starting point of the part,which is through the comparison of the characters. Gender identity and feminism are twoviews of this part. And the most concentrated expression in the text is the changes of malestatus, on the other hand is the women’s struggle and confusion. With the changes of thenew social situation, family ethics change too, etc. Conclusion: A summary about Coetzee himself and his Disgrace, and then it can giveus an revelation to our life today.