Text:1st Classtest
Task: Argumentative text

Coetzee's Foe is a re - ing of the classical Robinson Crusoe.

Looking at the title, yet, you can see that Foe can be understood like an "abbreviation" of De Foe. Compairing the titles, another important thing is that "Foe" is shorter than the original title of "Robinson Crusoe", this is because the two novels are written in different times, that entail different cultures and social background: as a matter of fact, Coetzee writes for today's people, who have not time to lose and that want something that attracts attention, faster and immediate. From this you can also notice that Coetzee uses an unusual word, a literary word, that makes the reader courious, while De Foe didn't need to use these tricks because he wrote only for intellectuals, and they didn't need to be attracted cause they had time.

Coetzee's novel starts in media res, while De Foe's starts talking about the person of Robinson Crusoe (when and where was he born, ...), and afterwards all the story of shipwreck is narrated. In Foe the story - line is summarized in the 1st chapter completely.

Writing Foe, Coetzee wants to make the reader think, he isn't interested to tell a story, but to involve the reader to analyse, to look at his/her reality.

The novel is turned to intelligent reader, that is he/she who is able to "interligere", to read between the lines. De Foe, on the contrary, writes a story, he wants to make the reader relax, he hasn't a second intention.

In Coetzee's novel there is another important point that makes it a post - modern novel: the narrator. He "uses" Susan, a woman, a 1st person narrator, so the reader hasn't much space to use his mind, at least in the first chapter, where the reader can see things only from her point of view, and the only occasions that he/she has to make up his/her own idea is when the characters speak.

It's very courious that both the main character and narrator is a woman because at that time women did not have an important position, as a matter of facts, women's position was really weak.

Also how was the shipwreck treated is --?--?--?--?--?-(non capisco la correzione) : in De Foe there is something really strange, to travel by boat it's an event, it means to go to adventure; in Coetzee, instead, it is something very common.