The Magistrate's Mixed Emotions

Due to the fact that he is the narrator of J.M. Coetzee’s Waiting for the Barbarians, it is easy enough for the magistrate to quickly become the center of attention of the story. Throughout the first three sections of the novel, I was especially intrigued by the actions that he takes when dealing with the Barbarians. It is clear from said actions that the magistrate is deeply conflicted on how he should regard the Barbarians. From cursing Colonel Joll for bringing the fishing people to telling the new officer that he hopes the Barbarians one day rise against the Empire to even taking one of the Barbarians into his bed, it seems as if he has decided that the Barbarians are in every way the equals of those people who live within the walls of the Empire. However, the vast amount of internal conflict present in the magistrate’s thought allows readers to see that there is more to his seemingly pro-Barbarian attitude than meets the eye. The way in which Coetzee depicts some of his interior dialogue allows us to see how even the magistrate himself realizes how radical it is for a high-ranking official located on the frontier to view the Barbarians as anything more than their name implies.
Through both the magistrate’s thoughts and actions, it becomes clear that the tension between the citizens of the Empire and the Barbarians is rapidly coming to a head. In the opening parts of the book, it is apparent that the gap between the inhabitants of the magistrate’s city and the Barbarians living just outside the border is larger than he initially cares to admit. Through his dealing with the prisoners and later the woman he takes a fancy to, we see that despite his desire to remain unprejudiced in his dealings with the Barbarians, he best sums up his current views on relations with them in the quote, “I [caught] myself in a moment of astonishment that I could have loved someone from so remote a kingdom. All I wanted now is to live out my life in ease in a familiar world, to die in my own bed and be followed to the grave by old friends.” (74), a saying which shows that though his ideals might be in the right place, reality dictates that he lives in a far different way than the utopian equality with the Barbarians that he desires suggests that he would. 409

Darwin and Hegel: Views from the Past

G.W.F. Hegel’s “The African Character”

• Focuses on the fundamental differences between Africans and Europeans as percieved in the Nineteenth century
• Claims that “negroes” lack religion, and thus humanity
• No conception of anything higher than themselves, which he views as a very negative attribute
• Hegel also discusses how African people during this time enslaved and sold each other (even their relatives) and uses this as evidence that they are morally on a lower plane than whites.
• Talks about traditions of African tribes, which he views as barbaric.
• Closes his argument by stating European slavery (and its gradual abolition) is a good thing for the Africans, so they can acknowledge a “higher being” and that immediately ending slavery would have been a regression.
• Finally, he claims Africa is historically irrelevant and that all the great societies of Africa were merely “not part of the African spirit.”

Darwin’s “On the Races of Man”

• Talks about the intrinsic similarities of man amongst the many outward differences.
• Gives a much more objective account that deals mostly with observed evidence of difference between the races of man.
• Claims that all men share a common ancestor, thus meaning that at most, different races should be considered “sub-species.”
• States that natural selection should be held accountable for the differences along the spectrum of humankind, not inferiority or superiority of certain ways of life.
• Sums up his argument with the quote “[t]he great variability of all the external differences between the races of man, likewise indicates that the cannot be of much importance.”

The End...or A New Beginning?!?!

In Section 4 of The Sound and The Fury, we are able to see the conclusion of the process that begins with Caddy’s loss of innocence, which we learn about way back in Section 1: the fall of the once-mighty Compson family. This process is finalized towards the end of the novel when Caddy’s daughter Quentin, the one remaining hope for a bright future for the family, finally calls Jason’s bluff and runs away from home with no prospect of being discovered.

The question I have is whether this serves as the beginning of a new branch of the Compsons, a final blow to an already defeated family, or a little bit of both. Has Quentin’s running away destroyed the Compson tradition forever, or was her leaving the toxic environment in which she grew up the only way she could hope to gain a normal future? Or again, was it a little bit of both: a reprieve for Quentin, but a knockout blow for the rest of the family? (169)