1. John Maxwell Coetzee b. 1940

2. Born in Cape Town, South Africa in 1940 to Afrikaaner parents
Studied mathematics and English at the University of Cape Town, graduated with honors in 1960 and 1961
Moved to England in 1962, worked as computer programmer for IBM
MA from University of Cape Town in 1963
Began Ph.D. at University of Texas at Austin in 1965, completed in 1969 (computer stylistic analysis and the works of Samuel Beckett) also influenced by Kafka and Dostoevsky
taught English literature at the State University of New York at Buffalo; here began his first novel Dusklands
sought permanent residence in US but was rejected, mainly due to involvement in Vietnam War protests
1971 returned to South Africa to teach English literature at the University of Cape Town till retirement in 2001
2002 moved to Adelaide, Australia and became Australian citizen

3. 2003 received Nobel Prize in literature for his ability to „portray the surprising involvement of the outsider”
In 1987 described South African society as consisting of „deformed and stunted relations between human beings” and a „deformed and stunted inner life”
In his 1992 essay Doubling the Point Coetzee descibes himself in the third person as someone who is „alienated…by all political language, in fact.”
In 2016 he was one of 61 signatories to a letter to Prime Minister Turnbull condemning offshore dentention of asylum seekers

4. Waiting for the Barbarians (1980)
„I have never seen anything like it: two little discs of glass suspended in front of his eyes in loops of wire. Is he blind? I could understand it if he wanted to hide blind eyes. But he is not blind”

5. „We are at peace here,” I say, „we have no enemies. ” There is silence
„We are at peace here,” I say, „we have no enemies.” There is silence. „Unless I make a mistake,” I say. „Unless we are the enemy.”
I am not sure that he understands me.

6. „Is there a point at which I will lie down and say, ‚Kill me—I would rather die than go on?’ Sometimes I think I am approaching that point, but I am always mistaken…there is no way of dying allowed me, it seems, except like a dog in a corner.”

7. „To the last we will have learned nothing
„To the last we will have learned nothing. In all of us, deep down, there seems to be something granite and unteachable…and who am I to jeer at life-giving illusions? Is there any better way to pass these last days than in dreaming of a saviour with a sword who will scatter the enemy hosts and forgive us the errors that have been committed by others in our name and grant us a second chance to build our earthly paradise? I lie on the bare mattress and concentrate on bringing into life the image of myself as a swimmer swimming with even, untiring strokes through the medium of time, a medium more inert than water, without ripples, pervasive, colourless, odourless, dry as paper.”