John Maxwell Coetzee, better known as J. M. Coetzee, is one of the most relevant writers of the 21st century and, without a doubt, the most celebrated writer South Africa has produced. In addition to being a writer, he is a linguist, translator, screenwriter, and university professor. He has received the most important literary awards in the world, including the 2003 Nobel Prize in Literature. If you have not read him, here at Aristopet we strongly encourage you to discover his work.
No, it is not that we have suddenly become intellectuals. We are talking about Coetzee because, if he knew of our existence, surely he would consider himself an aristopeter too. It is his animal advocacy that makes us talk about him on our blog today. Because Coetzee, one of the sharpest living minds, is a staunch defender of animal rights.
Coetzee addresses the subject of nonhuman suffering in many of his books, including “The Lives of Animals,” an argument against the holocaust of animals raised for consumption and in favor of a vegetarian diet. In that work, Coetzee’s alter ego, Elizabeth Costello, denounces the fact that 48 billion animals are killed around the world every year—that is, almost eight times the human population. This amounts to eliminating 130 million animals a day, more than five million per hour, and more than 100,000 per minute. This does not include the other billions of animals slaughtered, injured, or caged for entertainment, sport, or fashion. Chilling, isn’t it?
Personally, Coetzee has made statements as serious as this one: “People complain that we treat animals as objects, but the truth is that we treat them as prisoners of war.”
Coetzee empathizes with animals, acknowledges that they feel, and condemns any practice that fails to respect them. In this regard, the writer does not keep quiet about what he has to say, and our country in particular has been the focus of harsh -and well-deserved- criticism from him. “Torturing and killing bulls merely for spectacle belongs to the Dark Ages, not to 21st-century Spain,” he has said on more than one occasion. In fact, in 2013 Coetzee wrote a brief, lucid, and forceful open letter to Spanish parliamentarians to dissuade them from declaring bullfighting a “Cultural Heritage Asset.” You can read that letter here.
It was precisely his absolute rejection of bullfighting and other issues related to animal life that Coetzee discussed on June 30 at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía. Coetzee brought the Madrid Capital Animal 2016 program to a glorious close.
If you think this article might interest friends or acquaintances, be sure to share it. As we always say, the more of us there are… the better able we will be to raise awareness of respect and love for our best friends.