Waiting for the Barbarians

For other uses, seeWaiting for the Barbarians (disambiguation).

Waiting for the Barbarians

First edition cover
Author	J. M. Coetzee
Language	English
Genre	Novel
Publisher	Secker & Warburg
Publication date	27 October 1980
Publication place	South Africa
Media type	Print (Hardcover&Paperback)
Pages	156 (hardcover edition)
ISBN	0-436-10295-1(hardcover edition)
Dewey Decimal	823 19
LC Class	PR9369.3.C58 W3 1980

Waiting for the Barbariansis anovelby theSouth AfricanwriterJ. M. Coetzee.First published in 1980, it was chosen by Penguin for its seriesGreat Books of the 20th Centuryand won both theJames Tait Black Memorial PrizeandGeoffrey Faber Memorial Prizefor fiction. American composerPhilip Glasshas also written anopera of the same namebased on the book which premiered in September 2005 atTheater Erfurt,Germany.

Coetzee is said to have taken the title as well as to have been heavily influenced by the 1904 poem "Waiting for the Barbarians"by theGreekpoetConstantine P. Cavafy.

Coetzee's novel was as well deeply influenced by Italian writerDino Buzzati's novelThe Tartar Steppe(which too had been based on Cavafy's poem).

Plot

The story isnarrated in the first personby the unnamedmagistrateof a settlement that exists on the territorial frontier of "The Empire". The Magistrate's rather peaceful existence comes to an end with the Empire's declaration of astate of emergencyand with the deployment of the Third Bureau—thespecial forcesof the Empire—due to rumours that the area'sindigenous people,called "barbarians"by the people in the settlement, might be preparing to attack the town. Consequently, the Third Bureau conducts an expedition into the land beyond the frontier. Led by the sinister Colonel Joll, the Third Bureau captures a number of barbarians, brings them back to town, tortures them, kills some of them, and leaves for the capital in order to prepare a larger campaign.

In the meantime, the Magistrate begins to question the legitimacy ofcolonialismand personally nurses a barbarian girl who has been left crippled and partly blinded by the Third Bureau's torturers. He threatens to force the barbarian girl out of the city unless she stays with him. The Magistrate has an intimate yet uncertain relationship with the girl. Eventually, he decides to take her back to her people. After a life-threatening trip through the barren land, during which they have sexual relations, he succeeds in returning her—finally asking, to no avail, if she will stay with him—and returns to his own town. The Third Bureau soldiers have reappeared there and now arrest the Magistrate for having deserted his post and for consorting with "The Enemy". Without much possibility of a trial during such emergency circumstances, the Magistrate remains in a locked cellar for an indefinite period, experiencing for the first time a near-complete lack of basic freedoms. He finally acquires a key that allows him to leave the makeshift jail, but finds that he has no place to escape to and spends most of his time outside the jail scavenging for scraps of food.

Later, Colonel Joll triumphantly returns from the wilderness with several barbarian captives and makes a public spectacle of their torture. Although the crowd is encouraged to participate in their beatings, the Magistrate bursts onto the scene to stop it, but is subdued. Seizing the Magistrate, a group of soldiershangs him up by his arms,deepening his understanding of colonialistic violence by a personal experience of torture. With the Magistrate's spirit clearly crushed, the soldiers mockingly let him roam freely through the town, knowing he has nowhere else to go. The soldiers, however, begin to flee the town as winter approaches and their campaign against the barbarians collapses. The Magistrate tries to confront Joll on his final return from the wild, but the colonel refuses to speak to him, hastily abandoning the town with the last of the soldiers. The predominant belief in the town is that the barbarians intend to invade soon, and although the soldiers and many civilians have now departed, the Magistrate helps encourage the remaining townspeople to continue their lives and to prepare for the winter. There is no sign of the barbarians by the time the season's first snow falls on the town.

Awards and nominations

After Coetzee won theNobel Prize in Literaturein 2003,Penguin BooksnamedWaiting for the Barbariansfor its series "Great Books of the 20th Century".The Nobel Prize committee calledWaiting for the Barbarians"a political thriller in the tradition ofJoseph Conrad,in which the idealist’s naiveté opens the gates to horror ". It was nominated for the 1982Philip K. Dick Award.

Adaptations

TheoperabyPhilip Glassis based on Coetzee's book and Christopher Hampton'slibrettoadapts the story faithfully.The opera premiered on September 10, 2005, at the Theater ofErfurt,Germany,under the direction ofGuy Montavon.The lead role of the Magistrate was sung by British baritoneRichard Salter,Colonel Joll by American baritoneEugene Perry,who has starred in a number of Glass operas, and the barbarian girl byElvira Soukop.The musical director of the premiere wasDennis Russell Davies.As Glass told journalists and the Erfurt audience at a matinée, he sees scary parallels between the opera's story and theIraq War:a military campaign, scenes of torture, talk about threats to the Empire's peace and safety, but no proof. TheAustin Lyric Operaperformed the American premiere ofWaiting for the Barbarianson January 19, 2007, conducted byRichard Buckleyand under the direction of Guy Montavon, who was joined again by Richard Salter and Eugene Perry as the Magistrate and Colonel Joll, respectively, and mezzo-soprano Adriana Zabalaas the Barbarian Girl.

In August 2012, theBaxter TheatreinCape TownpresentedAlexandre Marine's stage adaptation of the novel.The production toured atMontreal'sSegal Centre for Performing Artsin January and February, 2013.

In October 2018, amovie adaptationdirected byCiro Guerraand featuringMark Rylance,Robert Pattinson,andJohnny Deppbegan production in Morocco. It was released on August 7, 2020.

External links

• ISBN0-09-946593-0(UK paperback, Virago)
• Cavafy's poem "Waiting for the Barbarians"