First Impressions of "Waiting for the Barbarians"

After finishing the first assignment of reading of Waiting for the Barbarians, I still can’t decide whether or not I like the novel. While reading, I found myself enjoying Coetzee’s style of writing; I appreciated the fact that he uses adjectives to describe characters and settings sufficiently but never overloads a subject with meaningless descriptions. Every now and then Coetzee throws in a word beyond my vocabulary, such as “obdurately” and “maieutic,” however, generally his diction is clear and understandable for me.

I am extremely fond of the speaker of this novel. I basically liked him the second he started talking about the peculiar pieces of glass in front of Colonel Joll’s eyes called “sunglasses.” I definitely was influenced by the speaker’s biased voice when he described Colonel Joll because I too disliked him from the minute he was introduced. As it turns out my feelings were justified from hearing about how he tortured innocent prisoners. Although I was influenced by the speaker’s opinions of the Colonel, he did not convince me to have disgust towards the barbarian woman as he initially did. Throughout the time while she slept in his bed with him I kept hoping that he would realize his true love for her. At times I was teased into thinking that he was falling in love with her. However, he admits, “Nor…does the pleasure I take in her, the pleasure whose distant afterglow my palm still feels, go deep,” (63).

In regards to the content of Waiting for the Barbarians, I initially thought I understood where the plot was going but then as I continued to read on the plot seems to jump around and now I have no idea what this novel is leading to. At first it focused more on the Empire and its dealings with the barbarians, including Colonel Joll’s adventure to capture prisoners and question them; after, the plot transitioned to the speaker’s personal life with women and his “relationship” with the barbarian woman and how his life has changed becoming an old man. Then it continues on to somewhat of an adventure story while they take the journey to take the barbarian woman back to the barbarians. At this point I am not sure about the overall identity of this novel but I am curious to see how it ends up. (389)