M Coetzee is a consistently self-effacing writer, Joyceanly present everywhere in his work yet nowhere visible. All the same, he has a recurring alter ego through whom he speaks when he is at his most passionate. It is typical of this author that he should choose for his spokesperson – although that is far too strong a word – a woman. When we first met her, in 1990’s Age of Iron, she was called Elizabeth Curren, and, again typically, she was dying. That novel remains one of Coetzee’s finest achievements.
