Life Matters: A Post-colonial Ecological Study Of Coetzee's Waiting For The Barbarians

Coetzee won both the Nobel Prize for literature in 2003 and Britain's Booker Prize twice.His works are filled with natural and ecological elements.Waiting for the Barbarians is one of the most important works which reveals Coetzee's post-colonial ecological ideology.In this work,Coetzee's post-colonial ecological writing is closely related to colonial wars instead of praising nature generally,which boosts distinct ethical politics.This thesis adopts post-colonial ecological theory to reveal the rich implications of post-colonial ecology in this novel.By analyzing some postcolonial ecological characters in the text of Waiting for the Barbarians,we can see his post-colonial ecological ethics,that is,Coetzee respects all forms of life,protects the ecological environment,promotes harmonious coexistence between human and nature,human and human as well as opposing all kinds of hegemony.This thesis is made up of five parts.The first part is a general introduction to Coetzee and his classic work Waiting for the Barbarians.Furthermore,it also makes a general literature review on this work,the post-colonial ecological theory as well as the structure and significance of this thesis.Chapter?analyzes the crisis of natural ecology caused by the empire.Chapter?discusses the crisis of social ecology caused by the empire,including the empire's cultural hegemony and military hegemony.Chapter ? analyzes the crisis of spiritual ecology caused by the empire,including the town's people,colonel Joll and the old Magistrate.The last part is the conclusion part.It makes a brief summary of the key points discussed in this thesis and and reaffirms the argument of this thesis---Coetzee's post-colonial ecological view,which is echoed in Waiting for the Barbarians.