“To Petrus”: Coetzee, Krog, Critics

Abstract

Through analysis of recent Coetzee criticism and Krog’s recent creative non-fiction this review-article invokes distinctions between ‘mimetic’ and ‘autotelic’ responses to text/context/reception interactions. If Coetzee is seen by his critics as autotelic (discourse deconstructed from within his work) Krog links imitations of the real to artistic and social commitment. Accordingly, Krog’s interpretation of Petrus’s story (the Petrus of Disgrace) differs from Lurie’s interpretation. Despite this the conclusion is that among contemporary writers of South African interest Coetzee and Krog offer literary criticism its richest rewards