In "Good Readers and Good Writers," Vladimir Nabokov made a case against the habit of bad habit, the unfortunate encounter, he said, between the "sullen reader and the sunny book." His central thesis, as I recall was this: that readers have been taught they need to identify with a protagonist in order to have a good reading experience. To counter this argument, Nabokov enjoined readers to learn how to leave themselves behind and encounter the world of the book as if it were new territory they were exploring. The point is not to see oneself in a book and revel in owning the story as "mine," he argued; it is to engage in a kind of voyage through decidedly, pointedly, unfamiliar territory, to encounter and try to understand a world where everything is new.

I think what Coetzee accomplishes with his unattractive, unpleasant, unreliable narrators is to push Nabokov's invitation to move into the world of the book in a new and, when he's at his best (as in "Disgrace") simply lapidary way. For most of us, I think, these unpleasant storytellers make us listen to the story more closely--to see more of what is being put before us. Coetzee's art consists in his concealing the artfulness of creating a story that is interesting and beautiful, even if it's being told by a complete toad.