Mulhall, S. (2022). In other words: Transpositions of philosophy in J.M. Coetzee’s “Jesus” trilogy. Oxford University Press.
“J. M. Coetzee’s ‘Jesus’ Trilogy extends and intensifies his long-term interest in engaging with a wide range of texts, themes and assumptions that help constitute the history of Western European philosophy. In this commentary, Stephen Mulhall extends his own earlier work on Coetzee’s previous stagings of the ancient quarrel between philosophy and literature by identifying and following out various ways in which the ‘Jesus’ Trilogy activates and interrogates themes drawn from Wittgenstein’s later philosophy. These themes include rival conceptions of counting and reading, the relation between concepts and wider forms of life, and the intertwined fate of philosophy, literature and religion in a resolutely secular world. In these ways, Wittgenstein’s, and so Coetzee’s, visions of the world disclose their uncanny intimacy with issues and values central to the critique of modernity elaborated in the work of Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Sartre.” — from Oxford University Press
Pippin, R. B. (2021). Metaphysical exile: On J.M. Coetzee’s Jesus fictions. Oxford University Press.
“This is the first detailed interpretation of J. M. Coetzee’s “Jesus” trilogy as a whole. Robert Pippin treats the three “fictions” as a philosophical fable, in the tradition of Plato’s Republic, More’s Utopia, Rousseau’s Emile, or Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Everyone in the mythical land explored by Coetzee is an exile, removed from their homeland and transported to a strange new place, and they have all had most of the memories of their homeland “erased.” While also discussing the social and psychological dimensions of the fable, Pippin treats the literary aspects of the fictions as philosophical explorations of the implications of a deeper kind of spiritual homelessness, a version that characterizes late modern life itself, and he treats the theme of forgetting as a figure for modern historical amnesia and indifference to reflection and self-knowledge. So, the state of exile is interpreted as “metaphysical” as well as geographical. In the course of an interpretation of the central narrative about a young boy’s education, Pippin shows how a number of issues arise, are discussed and lived out by the characters, all in ways that also suggest the limitations of traditional philosophical treatments of themes like eros, beauty, social order, art, family, non-discursive forms of intelligibility, self-deception, and death. Pippin also offers an interpretation of the references to Jesus in the titles, and he traces and interprets the extensive inter-textuality of the fictions, the many references to the Christian Bible, Plato, Cervantes, Goethe, Kleist, Wittgenstein, and others. Throughout, the attempt is to show how the literary form of Coetzee’s fictions ought to be considered, just as literary—a form of philosophical reflection.” — from Oxford University Press
Uhlmann, A., & Rutherford, J. (Eds.). (2017). J. M. Coetzee’s The Childhood of Jesus: The Ethics of Ideas and Things. Bloomsbury Academic.
“Since the controversy and acclaim that surrounded the publication of Disgrace (1999), the awarding of the Nobel Prize for literature and the publication of Elizabeth Costello: Eight Lessons (both in 2003), J. M. Coetzee’s status has begun to steadily rise to the point where he has now outgrown the specialized domain of South African literature. Today he is recognized more simply as one of the most important writers in the English language from the late 20th and early 21st century. Coetzee’s productivity and invention has not slowed with old age. The Childhood of Jesus, published in 2013, like Elizabeth Costello, was met with a puzzled reception, as critics struggled to come to terms with its odd setting and structure, its seemingly flat tone, and the strange affectless interactions of its characters. Most puzzling was the central character, David, linked by the title to an idea of Jesus. J.M. Coetzee’s The Childhood of Jesus: The Ethics of Ideas and Things is at the forefront of an exciting process of critical engagement with this novel, which has begun to uncover its rich dialogue with philosophy, theology, mathematics, politics, and questions of meaning.
Section I. Philological and Philosophical Concerns
1. What does J. M. Coetzee’s Novel, The Childhood of Jesus have to do with the Childhood of Jesus? – Robert B. Pippin
2. Pathos of the Future: Writing and Hospitality in The Childhood of Jesus – Jean-Michel Rabaté
Section II. Sociopolitical Concerns
3. Thinking Through Shit in The Childhood of Jesus – Jennifer Rutherford
4. Coetzee’s Republic: Plato, Borges and Migrant Memory in The Childhood of Jesus – Lynda Ng and Paul Sheehan
Section III. Intertextual Concerns
5. Creative Intuition: Coetzee, Plato, Bergson and Murnane – Anthony Uhlmann
6. The Name of the Number: Transfinite Mathematics in The Childhood of Jesus – Baylee Brits
Section IV. Ethical and Stylistic Concerns
7. J. M. Coetzee and the Parental Punctum – Sue Kossew
8. Coetzee’s The Childhood of Jesus and the Moral Image of the World – Tim Mehigan
9. Beyond the Literary Theme Park: J. M. Coetzee’s Late Style in The Childhood of Jesus – Yoshiki Tajiri
” — from Bloomsbury Collections
