“Youth” by J. M. Coetzee (post 5): Working as a computer programmer, not sure who he is, what he believes, or how old he feels, from moment to moment.

At the end of Youth—age 19 to 24, Part 2 of this memoir trilogy by the future Nobel novelist—things do not seem promising: “At eighteen he might have been a poet. Now he is not a poet, not a writer, not an artist. He is a computer programmer, a twenty-four-year-old computer programmer in a world in which there are no thirty-year-old computer programmers” (1, p. 283).

However, on the bright side, he has identity issues suggestive of multiple personality, which may explain why he is not sure who he is, what he believes, or how old he feels, from moment to moment:

“…who is to say that the feelings he writes in his diary are his true feelings? Who is to say that at each moment while the pen moves he is truly himself? At one moment he might truly be himself, at another he might simply be making things up. How can he know for sure? Why should he even want to know for sure?…he does not believe himself. He does not know what he believes” (1, p. 150-151).

“In his heart he does not feel himself to be more than eight years old, ten at the most” (1, p. 170), which suggests the presence of one or more child-aged personalities (a common type of alternate personality).

1. J. M. Coetzee. Scenes from Provincial Life: Boyhood [1997], Youth [2002], Summertime [2009]. New York, Penguin Books, 2011.