DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISHName: Gohil Devikaba JRoll no.: 05 Paper no.: 14Paper Name: African LiteratureTopic name: Feminism in ‘Waiting for Barbarians’E-mail ID: devikagohil13@gmail.com

Waiting for the Barbarians:‘Waiting for the

Barbarians’ is a novel written by J. M. Coetzee.

First published in 1980.The title of the novel is

taken from the poem ‘Waiting for the Barbarians’ by C. P. Cavafy.

A Greek poem.

What is feminism?

Feminism in Waiting for the Barbarians:The Barbarian girl is the

important character to read feminism in the novel.

Very openly her body is objectified.

We can read her character as the personification of ‘Nation’.

Magistrate compares her ‘old’ (without scares) body and ‘new’ (with scares) body – the idea of ‘old nation’ and ‘new nation’.

Feminism in Waiting for the Barbarians:The Magistrate never

asks the whether she wants the help or not.

He just goes on helping her, though his intentions are good but he never asks her.

We can say that she is the symbol of ‘Magistrate’s Sympathy’.

So she is the victim, victim.

Feminism in Waiting for the Barbarians:Feminist film critics says that “In

society woman is deprived of a gaze, deprived of subjectivity and repeatedly transformed into the object of a masculine Scopophilic desire”.

Scopophilic desire is a term which means to look at something and get pleasure.

In this process one (victim) suffers and others enjoy it (Empire, powerful people).

Feminism in Waiting for the Barbarians:So, here we can say that she is suppressed thrice

in the novel. By her own people

By the Empire and

By the Magistrate

Feminism in Waiting for the Barbarians:Sometimes the

suppression is so high that the victim can’t even talk or express the self.

Here the girl is also silent. She is not given a single

chance to express herself.She is subaltern here –

her voice is unheard by the authority.

Feminism in Waiting for the Barbarians:The same silence was also

used in ‘Waiting for Godot’ and ‘The Birthday Party’.

Silence symbol of being tortured and violence.

In Coetzee’s words ‘Waiting for the Barbarians’ is a novel about “The impact of the torture chamber on the life of a man of conscience”.

For your attention