100-2 英文心得徵文比賽第二名：應外三 紀○妤 Disgrace

What is more disgraceful? The inability to protect your beloved one or the desire that could harm someone’s beloved one? For David Lurie, a white man who always followed his heart, a man of charm, of confidence, of knowledge and of power, it might be a question he never thought he would have to answer. This is what causes the disgrace of his life: David thought he would always be right. David seduced his student Melanie to have a relationship beyond teacher and student. The affair was morally unacceptable, but David didn’t think it was wrong. He simply followed his feelings and his desire. Although he lost his job, his reputation, and his life in Cape Town, he never seemed to regret them at all. Instead, he contended that he was enriched with experiences from each of his relationships with different women. Even though what he did to Melanie could be regarded as immoral, he believed it was based on a proper reason: human’s desire, man’s desire. However, did it morally justify him? Could it be justified after all? David pleaded guilty on the hearing and refused to take any measure that could possibly save his job. He believed that he had given in to the society’s expectation and pleading guilty was the best and the last he would do. However, a committee member hit the mark with a single comment: Pleading guilty is not pleading wrong. Sarcastically, David did not come to realize the difference until the tragic accident that happened to his daughter Lucy. The affair between David and Melanie somewhat contrasts the relationship between David and Lucy. In his with Melanie, David was more like the one who dominates, the one thought to disgrace Melanie, but in his with Lucy, he somehow became the one who was disgraced. His daughter being raped, there was nothing David could do to stop it. Lucy had to live the rest of her life with such disgrace, like a dog. David had a hard time understanding Lucy’s decision because their perspectives on life were totally opposite. It was a time after apartheid. However, David still considered himself superior to black people while Lucy thought white-dominating times were over and now black people’s rights and power have risen, or if not, at least have been equal to that of white people. Lucy even thought white people had the responsibility to make up for what they had done because they white people owed it to the black. That’s what causes David’s disgrace. His daughter was raped by three black savages; his daughter, out of her own will, chose to give birth to the child whose father was unknown; his daughter would marry a black “dog man” in exchange of protection, the protection he, even as a white man of confidence, of knowledge and of power, was not able to achieve. In Disgrace, “dogs” have ample implications. David despised dogs. He believed that dogs, beasts without thoughts and feelings, were lower than humans. He also thought that Bev’s animal-welfare work was hypocritical in the first place. He looked down on Petrus, the dog man. However, all David’s prejudice only satirized how pathetic he ended up. Lucy’s comment, in her discussion on animals with David, again made a strong insinuation: I don’t want to come back in another existence as a dog or a pig and have to live as dogs and pigs live under us. David helped Bev with the euthanasia work, his sympathy for dogs gradually growing. He would finally feel sorry for the dogs to have to end their life in such a way. Perhaps he realized it might be the way how his life would end in the long run. Humans are no way better than dogs. Neither can decide its destiny. Humans may have more control over their lives than animals do, but humans also have to take harder consequences than animals have to. Disgrace tells a story that deals with so much of real life. A good book is a book that makes readers think. J. M. Coetzee makes readers ponder. I have to admit it’s been a bit tiring to keep the brain exercising but indeed, I learn a lot from thinking and get inspirations. I believe more discussions can be developed from Disgrace, and it is what makes it a must-read.