The last of my reviews for the books I read for the recent 24 Hour Read-a-Thon, features The Lives of Animals by J. M. Coetzee.

Synopsis (from the back cover)
Elizabeth Costello, a distinguished novelist, has been invited to the United States to give a university lecture on animal rights. She meets with reactions that run the range from sympathy to scepticism and hostility. In this disturbing story the internationally acclaimed novelist J.M Coetzee uses fiction to present a subtle discussion of animal rights in all their complexity.

I was really looking forward to this one, it looked so interesting, especially after reading the comment on the back of the book:

J.M Coetzee’s vision goes to the nerve-center of being. What he finds there is more than most people will ever know about themselves. – Nadine Gordimer.

A stimulating and worrying book, It is hard to imagine anyone coming away from it without a new perspective on our relation not only to animals but to the natural world in general, and, indeed, to ourselves. – John Banville, The Irish Times.

The bulk of the narrative is taken up by the two lectures given by Elizabeth Costello, the rest taken up by the reactions they generate at the University and her son’s family (who she is staying with). Unfortunately I never found, either these sections (nor the characters in them) or the lectures engaging enough to be able to connect with what was trying to be said.

Disappointing.

[rating:2/5]

Buy, The Lives of Animals (The University Center for Human Values Series), from Amazon.

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