Rating: 
Summary: Who?s story is this anyway?
Review: "Foe" is a short yet complex and rewarding engagement with Daniel Defoe's classic account of the archetypal castaway Robinson Crusoe. Coetzee approaches the story of Crusoe as one of dubious genealogy - in "Foe" it is related by the opportunistic castaway Susan Barlow, a woman who found herself stranded on the island kingdom of a man named Cruso and his mute servant Friday. At the time of the novel's telling, Susan and Friday are in England where she is attempting to get the tale of her adventures retold by the embattled writer Daniel Foe.The primary concern of this novel is the art of storytelling. It is a story that is almost painfully conscious of its status as a story; as a narrative, or rather, collection of narratives. As such, it is continually punctuated with other stories and echoes of other stories - fairy tales, myths, other novels - and is continually debating the ownership and authorship of the tale being told. This narrative reflexivity becomes most apparent when Foe acknowledges that they (the characters) are themselves the creations, `puppets', of some `conjurer unknown to us'. The relationships between the four main characters - Susan, Cruso, Friday and Foe - are constantly explored in terms of master/slave dialectics. The mutual dependency central to the master/slave dialectic is emphasized continually and the four characters form a complex web of relationships with reciprocating obligations and reliances resonating through the text. The most interesting of these bonds is Susan's relationship with Friday - a man whom she frequently regards as lacking even the most basic status as a person yet depends on nonetheless. Tellingly, Friday's lack of a tongue dooms his `story' to be forever lost. Through this relationship the text raises, if allegorically, the wider issue of the impact of European imperialism upon those who became subjects and their resultant lack of `voice' in the culture that enveloped them. The novel's primary flaw is its overt and all-consuming concern with issues of narrative voice and the status of language. These preoccupations verge on being heavy-handed and may deter some readers, particularly in the third section where Susan and Foe repeatedly engage in discussions of their own position in relation to the story that is being told. However, if you are even remotely interested in these issues you will find it a compelling and intelligent work. Because of the overriding concern with issues of narrative voice and origin in "Foe", the first-time reader of Coetzee would be better directed to either of his two Booker Prize-winning novels - "The Life and Times of Michael K" and "Disgrace" - as they are more orthodox (and more importantly, artistically superior) works and would serve as better introductions to the work of this important and increasingly recognised author. Nevertheless, "Foe" is a unique if imperfect accomplishment and well worth a read.
Rating:
Summary: Who¿s story is this anyway?
Review: "Foe" is a short yet complex and rewarding engagement with Daniel Defoe's classic account of the archetypal castaway Robinson Crusoe. Coetzee approaches the story of Crusoe as one of dubious genealogy - in "Foe" it is related by the opportunistic castaway Susan Barlow, a woman who found herself stranded on the island kingdom of a man named Cruso and his mute servant Friday. At the time of the novel's telling, Susan and Friday are in England where she is attempting to get the tale of her adventures retold by the embattled writer Daniel Foe. The primary concern of this novel is the art of storytelling. It is a story that is almost painfully conscious of its status as a story; as a narrative, or rather, collection of narratives. As such, it is continually punctuated with other stories and echoes of other stories - fairy tales, myths, other novels - and is continually debating the ownership and authorship of the tale being told. This narrative reflexivity becomes most apparent when Foe acknowledges that they (the characters) are themselves the creations, 'puppets', of some 'conjurer unknown to us'. The relationships between the four main characters - Susan, Cruso, Friday and Foe - are constantly explored in terms of master/slave dialectics. The mutual dependency central to the master/slave dialectic is emphasized continually and the four characters form a complex web of relationships with reciprocating obligations and reliances resonating through the text. The most interesting of these bonds is Susan's relationship with Friday - a man whom she frequently regards as lacking even the most basic status as a person yet depends on nonetheless. Tellingly, Friday's lack of a tongue dooms his 'story' to be forever lost. Through this relationship the text raises, if allegorically, the wider issue of the impact of European imperialism upon those who became subjects and their resultant lack of 'voice' in the culture that enveloped them. The novel's primary flaw is its overt and all-consuming concern with issues of narrative voice and the status of language. These preoccupations verge on being heavy-handed and may deter some readers, particularly in the third section where Susan and Foe repeatedly engage in discussions of their own position in relation to the story that is being told. However, if you are even remotely interested in these issues you will find it a compelling and intelligent work. Because of the overriding concern with issues of narrative voice and origin in "Foe", the first-time reader of Coetzee would be better directed to either of his two Booker Prize-winning novels - "The Life and Times of Michael K" and "Disgrace" - as they are more orthodox (and more importantly, artistically superior) works and would serve as better introductions to the work of this important and increasingly recognised author. Nevertheless, "Foe" is a unique if imperfect accomplishment and well worth a read.
Rating: 
Summary: Deep but dull
Review: Compared with other works by J.M. Coetzee, "Foe" is probably the weakest of all his novels. The story is deep and meaningful, but not presented in an interesting manner. Those who like a little action, romance, or intrigue in their reading will find none in this book. It is a pure allegory, exploring the responsibility of an author and the story he weaves.
The story begins in the 1720s, told from the view-point of Susan Barton as she narrates her timeless "adventure" as a castaway on an unknown island with a Robinson Crusoe-like figure called Cruso and his slave Friday, who is incapable of speech. Cruso and Friday feel at peace on the island, which they have come to acknowledge as their own kingdom, living their lives in primitive freedom, but Barton is eager to return to civilization. Her wish comes true when a ship finds the lonely island. However, Cruso dies of an illness; and therefore, Barton must care for Friday, who alone knows about Cruso's past but cannot reveal it. Feeling responsible to tell Cruso's story to the world, Barton approaches Daniel Foe, a famous writer. But recalling the past isn't an easy task, and Barton's letters become more than just a story about Cruso, but a portrayal of her struggles with her inner demons...
Coetzee's prose is simple and concise, but to fully grasp the essence of the story, the reader must look beyond the words into the theme of the book. The drawback is that it lacks a decent, driven plot - which greatly wears upon the reader's interest - but because of the profound insight, this novel still deserves 3 stars.
Rating: 
Summary: Who's the FOE in Coetzee's Defoe remake?
Review: Exquisite. Coetzee's Robinson Crusoe (by Daniel DeFOE) and more, much more. It's difficult to say and I change my mind twice a week but, at the moment, my favorite writer is a toss up between Coetzee and Gore Vidal.
Rating:
Summary: Not Coetzee's best, not Robinson Crusoe, but worth reading
Review: First of all, a few background details regarding me, the reviewer. Though Coetzee is a Nobel prize winner, the only book of his I have read is Disgrace, a dark, but rewarding, psychologically engaging novel(la). Given that brief experience, I had high hopes for this work - hopes that were only partially unrequited. Secondly, I read this immediately after finishing Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. Thus, I had certain contextual expectations in mind and - well, mileage may vary.
That said, I think that this is a very interesting twist on the Crusoe story. There are several levels at which the reader will likely reexamine Crusoe (particularly if the Defoe reading is fairly fresh). Not only does Coetzee take on the authority of Defoe, but also Crusoe, and perhaps even his own protagonist, Susan Barton. Moreover, the way in which Friday is employed (in the literary sense) raises interesting questions of colonialism, identification, and language. While Defoe presents Friday as a rather capable cannibal, Coetzee shows us a mute victim of man's violence.
The real weak spots of this work are that 1) it is a reinterpretation of an existing work, and these never really seem to "pull it off" (though this one comes closer than most), 2) given my limited reading of Coetzee, I am still quite capable of saying that this is not his strongest work, and 3) Coetzee tries to talk through a female character and, being male, I'm not sure that this really works.
The above criticisms laid out, I would still recommend this book. I would recommend (re-)reading Daniel DeFoe's Robinson Crusoe first, however. I suspect that the typical reader will find enough interesting twists upon the original tale that both works will be stronger in the imagination afterwards.
Rating:
Summary: To vex the literary world, Cruso as L'Etranger
Review: First of all, I enjoyed this book. It's surreal and dreamy, and Cruso is a great character, undeserving of the scorn that has been heaped (in tiny, feckless, literary-journal-sliced rashers) upon him. Read this for Cruso, a Mersault with a moral compass of his own devising. He lives well. I would take that last, suitably rendered in the past tense, as my epitaph. Still, the contortions that are going on here are a bit much. Coetzee is a published critic of English literature, and this novel seems to be his Shelob, a creature set down to trouble a weary age (probably not quoting my Tolkien just right). He writes that there was "No footprint" for example--well, the footprint in Robinson Crusoe is like THE most important, self-created-reality-skewing device that DeFoe employed to show Robinson's idyllic world upset by the mere hint of savagery. Susan Barton, the main character, encounters a dead infant on her agonizing jaunt across England. The symbolism could not have been more pungent. Or more open to interpretation. Ditto the ending: cryptic enough to rattle rarefied lit-journal cages from here to 2040. Coetzee is pretty cool, in any case. When I finish my grad courses I might read more of his stuff. Maybe if I hadn't had to read all the schlock criticism (oxymoron?), and had just picked this up, I would have been blown away.
Rating:
Summary: A retelling of a classic tale that's actually a reinvention.
Review: Foe begins as a realistic retelling of Daniel Defoe's classic tale, though names and situations have been sufficiently altered make such a retelling in fact a reinvention. What begins as a straightforwardly realistic narration, ostensibly epistolary in form, becomes, in the end, a discursive metaphor for the act of storytelling itself. Susan Barton begins as narrator of the novel but ends it as muse to an author (named Foe) whose own narration has become canonical (even to the point of being widely-known but rarely read). The 1st 40 pages of the book are linear--the shipwreck, the washing-ashore, the meeting of Friday & Cruso (sic), and--finally--rescue. But the subsequent parts of the novel, though no less linear, become less about a tale of shipwreck survival than about a tale of narrative survival. Susan Barton begins battling the punningly-named Foe for the survival of her original conception of herself as Cruso's living successor, while Foe, becoming more authoritative than mere scribe of her exploits, posits such possibilities as her daughter's reunion with Susan and those details which actually appear in the Robinson Crusoe we all know. The tension and focus shift (almost imperceptibly) from what is (in Susan's mind) to what could be (in Foe's). Susan is transmogrified from an actual character to merely the muse--the ennervating inspiration--that drives Foe to write his book. In the end, what we get is the story of how a story shapeshifts into its final form and how its failed possibilities are no less alive than its successful ones. The novel dives into the wreck of Daniel Defoe's failed alternatives and succeeds by plumbing what depths _Robinson Crusoe_ (probably) did not
Rating:
Summary: Interesting allegory but not Coetzee's best work
Review: FOE is a retelling of Robinson Crusoe in a dense, moralistic tale narrated from a woman's point of view. Coetzee is not as good here as he is in Waiting for the Barbarians or The Life and Times of Michael K. This novel strikes me as an allegory of the writer's creative process: Defoe as writer (or creative vessel); The "heroine" as nurse; Friday as "dark side," resistent to communication; Crusoe as the idea that must be embellished. While I admire Coetzee's creativity and introspection, Foe is not up to Kundera's best works as far as self-referential themes are concerned. If you are a devotee of writing and the creative processes you might like this book; if not, I'd recommend you read Barbarians or Michael K.
Rating:
Summary: A beautiful compelling masterpiece..
Review: I gaurantee that you won't be able to better spend 3-4 hours than to spend it reading this short novel! In this sort-of-retelling of the Robinson Crusoe story in the 'bigger picture', 'as it really happened', Coetzee asks us to think about what storytelling really is-- What liberties can authors take? Who's story can we really trust? Further, who is the real author of any narrative? But his cleverness and insights into his craft should not be the focus of a discussion about this book.. unless you're trying to figure out the mystical ending..
Rating:
Summary: Robinson Crusoe Re-Visioned
Review: J.M. Coetzee is an extraordinarily gifted and insightful writer. The only other novel of his that I've read is "Life and Times of Michael K," but both that and this novel, "Foe" are sparse, beautiful, enigmatic works. "Foe" takes a postmodern look at Daniel Defoe's classic eighteenth-century novel, "Robinson Crusoe." Of course, reading Defoe's novel first gives you the fullest understanding of the background Coetzee is working from, but I believe that as much as anything, it is unnecessary to be intimately familiar with Defoe. Defoe's novel is an appropriate novel to rewrite because the plot is one that is ingrained into Western consciousness - everyone knows the basic story of shipwreck, survival, and rescue. "Foe" takes such preconceived ideas and shows that although we may feel comfortable with that basic narrative, comfortability can cause us to take stories for granted and make us complacent readers. In "Foe," Coetzee turns the story, characters, and subject positions of Defoe's foundational novel on their heads to disrupt our ready notions of truth, trust, and story. The major question we ask throughout the very short novel is 'Who's story is the right one?' Is there ever one right story? Coetzee turns the autocratic, garrulous, enterprising Robinson Crusoe into Cruso, a stoic castaway who no longer cares to leave his island and spends each day in a futile pursuit. He builds terraces where nonexistent future generations can plant imported seeds. Friday, Cruso's servant, is changed from a subservient, excitable islander to a former African slave who may or may not have a tongue and does not speak at all. Coetzee's major innovation is the introduction of Susan Barton, the novel's primary narrator, who tells the story of the island in conversation and letters addressed to Daniel Foe, a noted English author. Susan, as narrator, deals intensely throughout the novel with trying to get Cruso's story published. Meanwhile, she attempts to handle her own issues, to wit, her search for a missing daughter, Foe's disappearance, and her torturous relationship with the mute Friday. Overall, this is a fantastic novel, fraught with problems of language, narrative, and gender.
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