welcome aboard! How wonderful that you will be with us!

D. is an intriguing, enlightening (*) book which will not disappoint you, I confidently predict. I know whereof I speak : The book was discussed last year in our live local afternoon book group, but time was simply too short. It did not help that a second (!) book was also on the agenda for that same meeting!...



(*) 'enlightening' because in this country we are familiar only, it seems, with the large events, the big names, like Nelson Mandela and his white adversaries. Now DISGRACE gives us the personal story, the reaction of an ordinary man through political upheaval and social unrest, how he is affected and what he does, half-dazed.

The discussion leaders, all volunteers, prepare meticulously, lovingly, and ahead of time for the respective discussions, aided by dedicated techies for setting up the header.

The respective book becomes their baby, the discussion their labor of love. Some DLs prefer a long pre-discussion; some opt for a shorter one, some announce the date and start right then and there. In each and every case the DLs' investment in dedication and time is considerable, requires daily input and continues for a whole month. From my own personal experience I can say that it is a huge responsibility not to be taken on lightly, and most certainly NOT as easy as it may look.

CAROLYN,

Murder, violence - domestic and otherwise -, abductions, kidnapping, carjacking, harassment of every kind, and God knows what else perverted minds will come up with next : Those are the realities we live with, unfortunately, so is it any wonder they are reflected in recent literature? ------- to wit, among others,

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold (rape), The Little Friend (murder of a minor, never solved), The Kiss by Katherine Harrison (incest). And what about the abominable practice of "putting down" perfectly healthy Greyhounds when they are no longer profitable racers?

I am half way through re-reading Disgrace with a new awareness. IMHO the book itself is not "brutal", it is brutally honest beginning with chapter One, but otherwise rather restrained.

Thank you for not giving up before we even started!

Mary Decker too has since married and has children. Neither is likely to forget the nightmare of that day.

My beloved adopted greyhound was named Zola for Zola Budd - at my DIL's suggestion; she too is a dedicated runner who still runs the arduous Boston Marathon every year after two children and foot surgery.

This is a slim book, a scant 220 pages, the narrative is stark and straightforward without stylistic "embroideries" or lyrical passages one might want to write down. But the issues! The issues are deeply human and universal.

CAROLYN, yes indeed, it is encouraging that young South Africans want to go back and help build a united country. Thank you and your daughter VANESSA for contributing her personal impressions and experiences for this discussion; that gives us a very personal, first-hand angle, which is always welcome.

This pre-dicussion phase is our chance to welcome reader friends, old and new, and to 'rally the troups', as it were. It is not always easy to discuss from afar a book of fiction that hinges on contemporary political events still unfolding on another continent. In order to keep as balanced a view as possible (to the extent it is), we will need and be grateful for personal experiences, such as VANESSAS's in NZ (see previous posts).

What is the legacy of the colonial powers?

What examples were set, if any?

Does a regime change automatically benefit everyone? What does it take to eradicate - or at least ameliorate - poverty?

The international powers (those who take a look at this continent at all) can do no mre than "disppaprove", but "dispproval" has no teeth. The people of the respective country are no better off: Now they are exploited by their own who live in ostentatious luxury behind high walls, ignoring the ever-present menace of famine.

South Africa is different, or so the world thought, there was inherent strength, good native leadership (Mandela) and great hope. But has the lot of the people really changed in the last decade?

Of cours, and thankfully, we are not called upon to comment on the situation, past or present, even as we are aware that "Disgrace" plays out with this historic background.

This is an opportune moment to thank the talented banner makers and techies whose work is much appreciated.

He is middle-aged and rues the fact that his once "commanding", "practiced" look at a woman no longer summons her instantly to his side. But he still likes pretty faces and recklessly seduces a 20-year old student of his, narrowly skirting rape.

There is no question that he abused his position of power. His excuses that this was a "different" experience and he was a "servant of Eros" carry no water with the Tribunal of his peers. David Lurie is defiant, self-righteous, evasive, uses sophistry - and ultimately resigns.

What exactly made him so reluctant to publicly admit he was wrong ? Was it his unwillingness to face his personal demons (which would continue to haunt him) ?

Was it arrogance ? The narrator is preoccupied entirely with himself; no thought is given to the harm he inflicted on this young woman, who was rumored to have taken (sleeping?) pills.

Is redemption possible ? Whence will it come ? Looking forward to seeing you posts.

He had been professor of modern languages. After the change in the SA government, or the "Great Rationalization", Classics and Modern Languages were done away with, and Lurie is relegated to adjunct professor of communications. Like all "rationalized personnel", he is allowed to offer one special-field course a year, irrespective of enrollment. In the year this story takes place, he is offering a course in the Romantic poets (page 3).

It is easy to see why he is bored, cynical even. He grew up in a house full of women, the narrator tells us; we can surmise that he was pampered, adored and catered to. His two marriages failed, and he is possessive (of Soraya) and jealous (of her husband). He is equally unwilling to let go of Melanie, as we see, and at some point convinces himself that she is the ideal he always sought and he is therefore perfectly justified in ardently pursuing her.

Yet, independently of a person's temperament, isn't it possible, perhaps even likely, that the convulsions of the long struggle against apartheid and the final change of government did leave a mark on every thinking individual in South Africa ? Could this be a contributing factor in David Lurie's malaise ? Perhaps JEAN (JEBER) can help us out here.

The professor plies Melanie with wine, conversation, music, and then dinner, but Melanie turns down his impudent offer that she spend the night (pp.10/11). Is it possible that she, the student, is flattered by his attention ?

As I said, I believe that the sexual encounters skirted but did not constitute actual rape. Melanie is passive, she does not protest, fight or resist. She does not cry out "no no", she endures.Is she frightened ? Her only self-defense : she stays away from classes, does not take the make-over test, then resigns from the course. The professor's world collapses.

The reader isn't told who reported David; the boyfriend and the roommate must have had something to do with it, and the parents were probably notified after Melanie's decision to quit the course. Did the college call the parents ? Or could we possibly infer from the reference to Melanie's having taken pills that she tried to kill herself? Was it at that point that the parents were contacted ? Or was the course of events as conjctured by the narrator on pp. 38-40. ?

All this is only the beginning of David Lurie's downfall. Coetzee has written before about a man broken down to nothing before he finds a measure of redemption: that was in 1983 in Life and Times of Michael K" for which he was awarded his first Booker Prize. To be awarded this coveted honor twice is indeed a rarity. But Professor Lurie has farther to fall than Michael K, an unsophisticated Cape Town gardener.

David Lurie does not have a high opinion of himself (we've come to call it "low self-esteem"); he thinks of himself as a cockroach one might discover to one's horror in the sink. That reminded me of Franz Kafka's The Metamorphosis in which the protagonist is so self-loathing and totally, miserably at odds with his domineering father (the book is heavily autobiographical) that he literally turns into a cockroach, no longer worthy of being human.

There are more references to animals in the follwing chapters of Disgrace, you will note.

Disgrace is a slim book, its language spare and without embellishments. Every sentence counts. It has been suggested that the book is an allegory of South Africa. That may well be true. Radical changes are hardly ever painless. We'll have a chance to consider that point at the end of our reading.

Lastly, there were surely other practical consequences of the "Great Rationalization" in SA in 1991 than just the change of Cape Town University College to the Cape Technical University and its new rules.

What are your thoughts on the rehearsal, the play itself, and Melanie's role in it ?

HORSELOVER, saw your post as I was editing mine. Will reread the chapter again.

ANNAFAIR, welcome !

If we consider David Lurie's weaknesses, his contempt of others, his belief that he can take what he wants without reprisal (in his case women he fancies), his stubborn insistence that there is no need for him to change, and his refusal to accept counseling,

would it be too far-fetched to regard these traits as symptomatic of the malaise (too mild a term, I know) of South Africa during and after apartheid ? And could we then read the story as an allegory ?

This is not off the subject, JEAN: Beginning with chapter 7 on Sep 8, our book shows the effects of some post-apartheid policies on the people of South Africa and the new realities, devastating though some are, where broad questions of conscience and culpability are refracted through the prism of personality and individual choice of the protagonists, most especially David and his daughter Lucy.

It was Soraya who ended the "arrangement". They had been meeting weekly for a year, he had begun giving her presents and talked about himself, a little. His weeks were structured. One Saturday morning he sees her slim figure in the crowd with two boys who can only be her sons (pg. 6), follows her at a distance, sees them entering an eatery. He walks by the restaurant a second time, the three are sitting at a table by the window and, for an instant, Soraya's eyes meet his.

Neither mentions the incident, Soraya keeps the appointments at first, but he feels a growing coolness as she transforms herself into "just another woman" and him into "just another client (pg. 7) Four weeks later she tells him that she is going to take a break because her mother is ill. When he asks her when she'll be back, she is evasive. When he doesn't hear from her, he contacts the agency and is told that Soraya has left (pg. . He has two other (unsatisfactory) "episodes" then pays a detective agency to track Soraya down. He calls her at her home; she denies knowing him, tells her he is harassing her in her own home and demands that he never ever call her again (pg. 10). His weeks are now "featureless", he spends more time in the library and, walking home on a Friday evening, he happens upon Melanie Isaacs who had caught his eyes in class. An "entanglement" ensues, too brief really to be called an affair.

The play David watches unnoticed in the auditorium is called "Sunset at the Globe Salon", a comedy of the new South Africa set in a hairdressing salon in Hillbrow, Johannesburg. On stage a flamboyantly gay hairdresser, two clients, one black, one white. There is patter among the three, jokes, insults. "Cartharsis seems to be the presiding principle : all the coarse old prejudices brought into the light of day and washed away in gales of laughter." Enters Melanie, her accent is "glaringly Kaaps" - to apply for the advertised job. She is clumsy. And that is the irony! Whites had never done menial work before. (page 23)

She is not in school when a test is taken, she stays away all week- his calls remain unanswered. At midnight on Sunday she appears on his doorstep. "Can I sleep here tonight ?", she whispers. "Of course, of course", he says. "No, no tea, nothing, I just need to crash." He wonders : "Does she know what she is up to, at this moment?" ... "What game is she playing?" That is a legitimate question for the reader too - Alas, we are not told.

I read only the book, never saw the movie, so I have no idea whether or how Stanley Kubrick's film might have differed from the novel. There may well have been comical elements in the book too, but what I remember best is the shock of reading this tale of an older man with a predilection for prepubescent girls whom he calls "nymphets", and the precocious 12-year old Dolores whose mother he marries so that he can be close to his Lolita...

A second movie was made in England in the late eighties with Jeremy Irons as H. Humbert. American film distributors refused (!) to participate in its release- hmmm. It was eventually shown on cable in this country, I believe. If so, I misssed it.

Next time I'm going to the library, I'll check to see whether they have a video of either film. But I have no wish to read the book again, as psychologically interesting as that might be.

Foreign words are there too, like "Schadenfreude" = a German noun that has no translation, as even the eminent language maven of the NYY, William Safire, admitted. It is a noun and means noticing and taking pleasure in amothers' misfortune.

Caught in the middle between blacks and whites in SA are those of mixed race. They were known under apartheid as "coloreds", lived as second-class citizens and were derided as progeny of forbidden racial mixing. They are descendants of European colonists; Malay and Indonesian slaves; Khoi and San bushmen, and other African tribes, and include Asians - proof that the races have mingled on the tip of Africa for more than 300 years.

How much has changed, if anything ? What are we missing ? An update from JEAN would be very helpful.

I have been brooding over a question which I intended to ask at the end of the discussion. Since we are going to get into the heart of the story come Monday, I'd like to ask it now, for all of us to ponder as we continue reading.

Can political change eliminate human misery ?

Last Tuesday afternoon= the first day of school in the greater Boston area, a black kindergartner who was in an after-school program run by the Wellesley (* see footnote) Community Children's Center, at Wellesley HS, was mistakenly placed on a Metco city bus and let out in Dorchester (** see footote). An alert mother waiting for her son at that bus stop noticed the lone boy. Her immediate understanding of the situation and reactions led to the happy outcome.

(* footnote) Wellesley is a wealthy, predominantly white suburb of Boston. (** footnote) Dorchester is part of the city of Boston where the black population has greatly increased since the seventies.

This incident has raised the question of racial bias, fueled by the revelation that this was not the first time a minority student from the suburbs was wrongly ushered onto a Metco bus headed for the city. Several inquiries are pending.

Boston went through a wrenching, devastating period of desegregation in the seventies. There was turmoil, violence and deep, lasting resentment. I stared at the TV screen then, uncomprehending, thinking of George Wallace in Alabama. With an incident like this all these many years later, how can we fail to reflect on that past and take stock?

About a year ago Harvard University commissioned a study about the effects of desegration in Boston. The report was delivered at a conference a weekend ago, the finding was disappoining : "white flight" out of the city, the remaining whites are in private schools, black and hispanic students are the majority in the public schools.

I submit this to you simply for your information.

Lucy is reading in bed, in the front room David watches soccer on TV; the commentary alternates between Sotho and Xhosa, neither of which he understands, and he nods off. When he wakes up, Petrus is beside him on the sofa with a bottle of beer in hand and has turned up the volume.

How did that strike you ? Is the handwriting on the wall ?

Lucy has her bare feet firmly planted on the soil, but what is in her heart ? What motivates her ? Love of the country ? The need to put one foot in front of the other ? Idealism ? Fatalism ?

We discover that she is not one to bear her soul, but father and daughter do have some good talks, some verbal sparring, David "lectures"-- and somehow Lucy emerges as the wiser of the two.

Back tomorrow.

Was Petrus conveniently absent on purpose ? Did he know what was going to happen ? What does that say about him and his intentions regarding Lucy's farm ?

Will join you in the afternoon; I have to drive to a meeting and must leave the house early to avoid commuter traffic.

The act of the rape (by all three men) is made infinitely worse because Lucy is lesbian - something Petrus, for example, is bound to have known. We cannot know to the end of the book what made Lucy decide not to make a full report to the police. Would it have helped ? Changed anthing ? And if she had, might that not have deepened her violation (in the true sense of the word) and her sense of shame ? Ettinger and Bev Shaw support Lucy, as does David of course, but isn't there a conspiracy of silence, a complete denial of what REALLY happened?

Yes, HATS, the reader is devastated by the brutal description.

Friends, today I had one of those appointments one dutifully and meticulously prepares for and waits forever to begin and, mercifully, end in due course. Well, I was supremely prepared for the wait with a pad and pen at the ready. Actually, I've come up with an epiphany or two ...

See you in he morning.

http://www.quinion.com/words/qa/qa-aun1.htm.

http://www-users.york.ac.uk/~ad15/SApolitics.htm

Later David says, "... is this what you want in life"?, waving a hand toward the garden, toward the house with sunlight glinting from its roof. "It will do", replies Lucy quietly. (pg. 70)

David reports on market day in the same spare, dispassionate voice : There are three African women selling milk, butter and soup bones; an old Afrikaner couple, Tante Miems and Oom Koos, have potatoes and onions to sell, like Lucy; her potatoes are washed. Koos and Miems's are stll speckled with earth.

In the course of the morning Lucy takes in almost 500 rand. There is plenty of trade also in the milk and meat stall; the Afrikaner couple, seated side by side, wooden and unsmiling, does less well.

David is introduced to Bev Shaw and her husband, and cares for neither, nor for their home; his physical description of Bev borders on the cruel. He has no interest in animal welfare; his remarks about animal welfare people are cutting, bitter and opinionated (pg. 73). There is a telling exchange beween David and Lucy on pg. 74, "... You do not approve of friends like Bev and Bill Shaw because they are not going to lead me to a higher life ..."

David does go to the clinic; Chapter Ten is a devastating 'prelude' to worse and personal degradation in Chapter Eleven, about which more later.

Earlier I suffered through a very long session with a very eager salesman of replacement windows who tried (in vein) every trick in the book to get me to sign on the dotted line, Today !! He looked dejected when he finally left, and I felt almost sorry for him.

http://www.albionmich.com/inspiration/fromfairestcreatures.html

On pg. 116, "Baas" means boss, and "Klaas" is class. JEAN, please correct me if I am wrong.

This is clearly a cynical reference to the olden days when the boss gave the orders and the help carried them out: but pp. 116-118 show the role reversal on market day.

True, Petrus (still) does the work, but it is HE who makes the decisions, he sets up, he knows the prices, he takes the money and makes change, while David sits by, idle, inactive, clearly rendered superfluous - even obsolete.

Still, David knows precisely what Petrus is after (and what the reader is beginning to suspect) : first Lucy's land, then Ettinger's, who would be a harder nut to crack than Lucy, even though his only son has fled and he is alone. Neither Lucy nor Ettinger have a place in Petrus's vision of the future. That is the harsh reality.

The reader may be (?) pepared to accept that Petrus's absence on the day of the attack was conspicuous, but less willing to ask the next logical (unthinkable) question : Did Petrus mastermind the attack in order to fast-forward the inevitable process and, if so, what other devious means might he have up his sleeve to further the plan ?

www.nytimes.com/library/books/102699coetzee-booker.html

I have hinted before at this foible , this predilection of mine to carefully scrutinize an author's face for clues on a given book.

These are my thoughts : the hardcover jacket of DISGRACE shows a thin, white-haired, unsmiling, ascetic-looking Coetzee. But the picture (by Reuters) in the NYT article shows him as an obviously younger, handsome man with full dark wavy hair, wearing the hint of a smile and looking for all the world like David Lurie in his heyday.

On pg. 101, two sisters ( chuchotantes) are whispering within David's earshot in the hospital waiting room. The French verb for whisper is 'chuchoter"; chuchotant is the present participle functioning as noun here, with the requisite addition of the endings for the fem. gender and the plural.

Pg. 102 : "...there are men who do not readily make friends, whose attitude toward friendships between men is corroded with scepticism ..."

Ah, BUT aren't there also women who don't make friends all that easily and trustingly -except perhaps in their teens ? Any thoughts on this assertion in the book ?

Pg. 103 : What are we to make of David's vision ? Is it possible to conceive of a 'soul' leaving the body in extreme despair to plea for outside, reachable help ?

Chapter Thirteen, pg 107.

After returning to the farm, David has "for the first time a taste of what it will be like to be an old man, tired to the bone, without hopes, without desires, indifferent to the future ... interest in the world draining drop by drop..." And when he is bled dry, "he will be like a fly-casing in a spiderweb ..." in other words, a non-entity, just like a loathsome cockroach one might discover in the sink at night (see the earlier text during the Soraya period).

Pg. 110 "... in a country where dogs are bred to snarl at the mere smell of a black man ..." How does the reader react to this brutal reality ? One might bring up pit bulls enjoying increasing popularity in this country. Why and for what purpose (if any) are they bred and by whom? They are known to have inflicted grave injuries, and killed.

Pg. 112 gives a clue (unconvincing to the reader) on how Lucy feels " ... what happened to me is a purely private matter. In another time, in another place it might be held to be a public matter. But in this place, at this time, it is not. It is my business, mine alone." (emphasis mine)

Lucy is inactive, even apathetic on their return, and it falls to David to water the garden and keep a semblance of routine. Then Petrus returns ...

Whether he consciously sets out to change or not, he has no choice but to adapt to the circumstances; he does what must be done, the watering, the daily routines, even the cooking. He describes all of this matter-of-factly and without self-pity. The physical labor numbs him to the emotional burden he carries because of Lucy's withdrawal and unwillingness to discuss the attack.

David takes it upon himself to confront the newly returned Petrus with questions to which he receives few answers. The power dynamic has clearly changed.

In parentheses a note on "Kaffraria" (pg. 122) : It is the former name for a region in the Transkei in East SA. It was founded in 1848 as the dependency of British Kaffraria and added to Cape Colony in 1865. The Transkei in turn is a former black "homeland" and nominal republic. Much of the territory of that former homeland is hilly or mountaineous, there is little good farmland. Roughly two thirds of the Transkei's income was provided by the SA government, and all trade was conducted through South Africa. Most of the area's inhabitants speak a Xhosa language.

I'll write more tomorrow. But before I go, some questions :

Why do you think is David so preoccupied with the lot of the two slaughter-sheep and their being tethered on a barren patch rather than in an area where they could graze ?

How can Petrus possibly presume to guarantee that Lucy will be "safe" espcially since one attacker is back ?

What game (pg. 137) IS Petrus playing ?

The other one is "verwurzelt" or "eingewurzelt" - I can't find the page now, but the core of the word is "Wurzel" = root (BTW, German nouns are capitalized). The meaning of verbs is determined by the respective prefix (= HUGELY important!).

Whatever the prefix, the word means firmly rooted with heart and soul , inseparable from a piece of land.

I have total empathy with Ettinger on the basis of my own experience. But I do not wear my heart on my sleeve, nor do I believe that the details of my life could be of even the slightest interest to the anonymous internet world out there.

Will share the researched material as soon as I can.

He witnesses the attack and his daughter's disgrace; the degradation strikes him that much harder. At this point in the book there is no solution.

I believe we must read between the lines, beyond the casual tone, to realize that the narrator is in agony (or in hell fire, as some might say). But let's give him credit for telling it "like it is": he does not spare himself, makes no excuses; in sum, he is honest.

He is relieved that press reports of the attack on the farm give Lucy's last name a spelling different from his own, so that there is no further stain put on his. He is concerned enough to track down his former second wife, Lucy's stepmother, to let her know about the attack in cautious terms, lest she be upset by press accounts.

This is not an intrinsically BAD man despite his profligacy, which none of us here could or would want to overlook, much less condone. He is not hopeless - but the situation in which he finds himself might well be just : hopeless <P/>.

More soon.

http://www.eze1.com/mask02.htm

http://www.kmtspace.com/benin.htm

http://www.arm.arc.co.uk/britishBenin.html

http://www.madebyearth.com/benin_mask.htm

http://www.sas.upenn.edu/African_Studies/Country_Specific/Benin.htm

http://www.revdrjohnson.com/ancient.htm

http://www.artofwestafrica.com

http://www.sas.upenn.edu/African_Studies/Country_Specific/Benin.html

Back tomorrow

http://www.englishhistory.net/byron.html

http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Parc/9893/byron2.html

http://www.englishhistory.net/byron/images.html

His "re-entry" into Cape Town after an absence of not quite three months is not a happy return; in fact, there IS no return to his old life. Finding his house ransacked, he muses

"No ordinary burglary. A raiding party moving in, cleaning out the site, retreating laden with bags, boxes, suitcases. Booty; war reparations; another incident in the great campaign of redistribution. Who is at this moment wearing his shoes ? ..."

"There is something unfinished in the business with Melanie." (pg. 190). But there can be no new beginning. He is summarily chased out of the theatre by the hissing boyfriend, whose name is Ryan we now find out. "Didn't you learn your lesson," Ryan asks (pg 194).

More later.

Yesterday I read somewhere that, despite continuing strife, SA is considered a paradise by many other Africans. Untold numbers of people from Zimbabwe, for example, both men and women, regulardly and illegally into SA in desperate search of work. Those captured in SA are returned to the border, either by truck or by train. The transport by train takes hours longer because the train with the captured illegal immigrants on board must let more "important" trains pass first. On such occasions some people jump out of the train and disappear into the countryside. Many have been deported several times over; all interviewed for the article vowed to try and try again.

In a larger sense, I believe this was also David's personal acceptance of the new realities, his giving up the old concepts and prejudices to "go with the flow" of the new. In the final analysis there IS hope expressed in this book, as LORRIE and HATS have said. I am grateful for your insights, which truly have made me see things with greater clarity.

We are not quite done yet, though; I'd like to identify a few more references for the sake of good order, and also get back to the Byron connection (briefly).

JEAN, thank you for posting just when you did. Yes, I noticed your post about David Lurie's side trip to George, and I've followed up since. CAROLYN's revelations are news to me. They lead me to ask at least one disturbing question : Why are we "hazy on facts" ? I won't venture any further because the "Patriot Act" that looms over us all has me very seriously concerned

I agree, JEAN, the book is essentially cheerless, it begins with a jolt, and things only get worse. David is somehow more real to me, though antipathetic in the extreme, than Lucy who seems to have been molded for a "role" ; but did the character HAVE to be a lesbian for the author to get the point across?

As for the author's motivation to leave SA - only he knows what it was. I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. His was a life of teaching and writing; he was not part of the ruling hierarchy and did not carry the burden of misdeeds. Whatever his reasons for leaving, they are his business. That he chose Australia is, I most scerely believe, a compliment, a tribute. Just MHO,

One year ago I lost my loyal Greyhound. I adopted her in 1991 from a rescue kennel here in Massachusetts; she had just been brought in from a racetrack in Connecticut.

The plight of the Greyhounds is shocking and heartbreaking. If they are not "money makers" on the track, they are casually 'discarded'. The "industry" is vague about the number of perfectly healthy dogs that are "put down" every year. I laud and praise the rescuers and will always be grateful to them.

I named her Zola, for SA barefoot runner Zola Budd. She was an incomparable, unforgettable companion. Late last summer she was visibly ailing; the vet found nothing. The malaise continued and, in despair, I went to a different veterinarian whose thorough examination included an X-ray and ultrasound. She was found to be bleeding internally from a large tumor on her spleen. There was no hope. I still miss her.

His forebears set a bad example : His grand-uncle, from whom he inherited the title, was called the "Wicked Lord" for killing a neighbor and presiding over orgies. His father, "Mad Jack" Byron, seduced rich heiresses, squandered their money, fled his debtors, and finally joined his equally loose-living sister in France, where they became lovers, and where he died when his son was 3 years old.

Young Lord Byron attended Harrow and Cambridge and, when he was not rushing off to London to participate in every kind of amusement available there, he started scribbling verses, which had an encouraging critical reception.

Like many young noblemen of the time, he wanted to go abroad. But the traditional pilgrimage through France and Italy was a bit hazardous in the midst of the Napoleonic Wars, so Byron chose an off-the-beaten-track journey through Portugal, Spain, Greece and Turkey. It inspired Child Harold's Pilgrimage , a long travel poem, and it made him famous.

Perhaps success spoiled Lord Byron : Titled women threw themselves at him; most persistent was Lady Caroline Lamb. When their brief affair was over, she took to stalking Byron everywhere in London = a huge embarrassment, but only the beginning of the scandals.

While growing up, Byron had seen little of his older half-sister Augusta, who, later, turned out to be neglected by her husband. Brother and sister began first an epistolary exchange, then physical consolations. Byron's friends were appalled and urged him to 'reform'. A brief marriage to an intelligent young heiress lasted barely a year. Byron left England in 1816, never to return.

to be continued

JEAN, I'll start my answer again with the next post, so that at least this introduction will get through.

His personal life continued to be "busy", to put it gently. He was good friends with Percy Shelley and Mary Godwin- later Shelley's wife, and part of the ménage included Clare Clairmont, Mary's stepsister. She and Byron had a daughter together, Allegra. Allegra is featured in our book and we have to return to her later.

It was in Venice, where Byron lived riotously (and not only at the famous annual Carnevale) that he first met Teresa Guiccioli née Gamba, 19, newly married to thrice-as-old Count Guiccioli, whose third marriage this was. It was in January of 1818. Just imagine the electricity, the potential of this encounter !

I will continue but feel safer posting this now; I don't want to start again ...

But his artistic vision changes : Back in his ransacked house after 3 months with Lucy, he 'scales down' his original concept of "lush orchestration" à la Strauss (Richard, presumably), leaning toward a "meagre" accompaniment - violin, cello, oboe, possibly bassoon. Even the sound of the piano is too "full". Then he retrieves the toy banjo he had once given to Lucy from the attic, and that will be the "voice" of the story. But Lurie (Coetzee) is still fascinated with threesomes : while he works away in the ruined house, subsisting on coffee and cereal, he lives with Teresa and Byron.

Then there are further changes in viewpoint : In "Byron in Italy" Lurie first thought of capturing Byron and Teresa at the height of passion. But by the time he returns (further demoralized) to Lucy's and the Eastern Cape, he has a different angle on his story : With Byron long gone, "walking among the shades", it becomes the futile lament of a "dumpy little widow keeping house for her aging father". The parallel with Lurie's own dwindling prospects is quite plain, I think, and the role of the loving deformed dog heartbreaking.

I'd better post this now lest I lose it all again.

For his part, Lurie could not dismiss (nor forget) Melanie as easily as the other casual partners in his regular sexual encounters. He made her into an ideal, "salvation personified".

With due respect it seems to me that all things were NOT equal, circumstances were vastly different, and whatever connection, real or implied, is tenuous IMHO.

To Allegra tomorrow.

http://www.englishhistory.net/byron/images.html

and for Teresa :

http://www.englishhistory.net/byron/images/teresa.jpg

http://www.xs4all.nl/~androom/biography/p004287.htm