After crossing oceans, a man and a boy - both strangers to each other - arrive in a new land. David, the boy, has lost his mother and Simón vows to look after him. In this strange new country, they are assigned a new name, a new birthday, a new life.
Knowing nothing of their surroundings, nor the language or customs, they are determined to find David's mother. Though the boy has no memory of her, Simón is certain he will recognize her at first sight. "But after we find her," David asks, "what are we here for?"
The Childhood of Jesus is a profound, beautiful and continually surprising novel from a very great writer.
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[The man at the gate points them towards a low, sprawling building in the middle distance. 'If you hurry,' he says, 'you can check in before they close their doors for the day'.]***
(Vintage, 2 January 2014, 329 pages, paperback, borrowed from my library)
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I adored The Childhood of Jesus.
Coetzee has been on my list of authors to read since I read this book's sequel ( The Schooldays of Jesus) in 2016.
Both books can be read separately without being confused about who the characters are and what's going on.
This is an odd book and different from my usual stuff. The book like its sequel is quite vague, deliberately so. You don't get a real sense of who the characters are or the where and when the book takes place. This would normally put me off but works really well with The Childhood of Jesus.
Something about this odd set up really works. I found myself really growing to care for David and Simón even though, for a large chunk of the book, they are blank slate, David more so. Simón really struggles in this new world where the past is expected to be wiped clean, forgotten forever. He tries to cling to what he remembers about the past and there are some touching moments. I especially found his insistence that Ines is David's mother very moving. This becomes an obsession for him. I see it another way he is trying to cling to the past.
There is so little world building in The Childhood of Jesus and yet I still got a real sense of the world Coetzee is trying to create. Because we get little more than a blank and white sketch anything is possible.
Like the sequel, the book does not appear to have anything to do with Jesus or religion. Not anything obvious. I wonder why Coetzee chose the title. Maybe the book is set during biblical times and David is the boy who grows up to be Jesus. Or maybe not.
I definitely need to read more of Coetzee's work.
