Elizabeth Costello

J.M. Coetzee’s novel ‘’Elizabeth Costello’’ was published in 2003. It concerns an Australian writer with a name eponymous to the the book’s title, who has long left Australia, and now spends her days in Great-Britain. Travelling around the globe with her son John she gives lectures on various subjects, such as the value of the contemporary novel. Praised as a writer for her work, and especially her famous novel ‘’House on Eccles Street’’, Costello feels she has reached a stage where the writing part stops, and where the part begins where she can sit back and enjot being lauded for her complete oeuvre. Costello often asks her son John whether they can leave a conference or some gathering of people coming to listen to her speech, however, she also quickly realises that this would indeed hurt her name. Then, grittingly, she does in fact get on with it, albeit unwillingly. Coetzee’s novel consists of a narrative which is built completely around several of the lectures Costello gives. Ironically, most, if not all, of these lectures are highly remniscient of lectures Coetzee has given himself. Some, in fact, mirror his speech exactly. It seems that the novel is more focused on the speeches than on the narrative itself, and to aid in that principle Coetzee has come up with a handy device to create this focus.
What Coetzee often does in his narrative is interrupting it. The narrator, whose identity remains unknown throughout the novel, announces every few pages that it is now time to skip over a part in the narrative as there is no necessity for the telling of it. This then raises suspicions about why this would be done. It can be said that, because of the seeming speed of the plot, Coetzee gives himself the opportunity to focus more on Costello’s/Coetzee’s speeches. It is, however, unclear as to why Coetzee would want to achieve that speed. Another reason, as pointed out in class, would be that in interrupting the plot focus could shift to the literary value of the text. This is the case as the plot itself is not as strong as the lectures and thus the novel would gain literary value by emphasising its strong points rather than its weaker parts.
A further reason for skipping plot parts is given by the narrator itself. He says: ‘’We skip to the evening, to the main event, the presentation of the award (Coetzee 16).’’ This implies that the narrator only skips over small, unnecessary parts of the plot, which either have no relevance, or which is simply not interesting. Albeit so that this is not surprising it is an innovative device which, undoubtely, adds a layer to Coetzee’s novel. And, because only small scenes are skipped over, it means that any potentially dull parts can also be completely abandoned in favour of the lectures.
Although the skipping of scenes is found throughout the novel it features primarily in its earlier stages. An undefinite reason why Coetzee has slightly abandoned his device cannot be pointed out, but it seems that the character developement of Elzabeth Costello is a part of this. As the plot progresses Costello changes as well; she spends far less time remniscising her old days of glory, and more time wondering about her own writership. Furthermore, she connects much less with her son. All these circumstances simply call for more to be said about Costello, and thus, for less to be skipped over.
Coetzee’s ‘’Elizabeth Costello’’ is a novel and a collection at the same time. A narrative built around speeches of the main protagonist calls for bits to skipped over and focus on the lectures, and this is exactly what is being done by Coetzee. He uses an excellent, innovative device that speeds up the novel and which creates a context through which the speeches can be viewed not simply as seperate from the plot, but as incorporated in it.