Michael K, at thirty-one years old, has
survived a difficult childhood (institutionalised with a hare lip and a slow
mind) and early adulthood to eventually hold down a job in the parks and
gardens department in Cape Town, South Africa.
But now the government of the city and the
whole country is collapsing under civil war and, to make matters worse for
Michael, his sick mother needs him to look after her. With unrest on the
streets and squalid urban living conditions, Mrs K wants to leave town and
travel up-country to her childhood homestead of which she has fond, if
rose-tinted, memories. That is a big ask for Michael what with travel
restrictions, roads filled with soldiers, militia and guerrillas, and a woman
who cannot walk more than a few steps. But he is resourceful and fixes up a
sort of barrow and wheels his mother off.
His survival skills are tested by the military
and civil authorities and he endures hospitalisation, incarceration, isolation
and interrogation; not to mention cold, thirst and hunger.
Most of the narrative is from Michael’s point
of view, with a brief contribution by a doctor who becomes interested to the
point of obsession with K’s case and his outlook on life and death. It provides
a useful, articulate, counterpoint to Michael’s less analytic outlook.
It is a spare and haunting read that leaves
the reader despairing for Michael’s well being and sharing the doctor’s
bemusement at Michael K’s self-appointed role as a long-suffering but perennial
survivor.
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