Illustration allegory of post-apartheid in Coetzee's Disgrace

This article powerfully attempts to depict allegory of post-apartheid to enhance communication social, political and historical reality of the South Africa in the novel of Coetzee's Disgrace. In this study, allegory is the most appropriate tool to express the reality in a distanced/alienated manner and J .M. Coetzee uses it to its fullest in giving the truest picture of life through his novels. In particular this study investigates allegory as powerful literary medium for portraying hidden social disorder in the setting of Coetzee's works and how the novel criticizes Coetzee’s Disgrace as a postcolonial allegory for the rising dominance of the oppressed black South Africans, the consequences for those in positions of power and the repentance and gradual acceptance of past mistakes by white South Africans. This study also benefits from Michel Foucault’s perception of power, authority, knowledge and truth in analyzing the experience of South Africa society and Paul De Man’s theories on allegory to depict and the concepts of ‘allegory’ as a medium by which Coetzee manages to write under the apartheid and post-apartheid regime .By examining Coetzee’s works with a great scrutiny this study attempts to highlight how literature and society are complementary to one another, and to demonstrate that J.M. Coetzee in his novel respectively tries to rectify the popular misconception of post-apartheid.

Keywords:

Allegory , post-apartheid , post-colonialism , Paul De Man , Michel Foucault