The Pole

The Pole by J.M. Coetzee
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Beatriz, middle aged, Spanish, attractive woman with a solidly established family is asked to take care for a Polish pianist visiting Barcelona for concert of Chopin's music.
The concert doesn't make a good impression on her, the pianist, almost 25 years her senior - even worse.
Still, almost against her own will, she got entangled in a web of his dreams.
What struck me most is the fact that all very intimate thoughts and feeling of Beatriz are described in detail by the man.
It happened that the 3 last books I read were written by women and I am sure that they could not be written credibly by men.
So I have to treat this book as a sort of sweet dream of old man.
On the other hand I appreciate the language and style of J.M. Coetzee writing and this I liked regardless of the story.

P.S. Interesting point is that the book has been originally written in English but was first published in Spanish translation by an Argentinian publisher.

J.M. Coetzee explained that he wanted to break domination of Northern hemisphere over the book market.

Privilege of rich and famous.  

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