FROM “PACT” TO REFLEXIVITY: THE AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL STRUCTURE IN SCENES FROM PROVINCIAL LIFE BY J.M. COETZEE

DOI: 10.18173/2354-1067.2025-0038

Abstract

This article examines the genre-specific features of Scenes from Provincial Life (the trilogy: Boyhood, Youth and Summertime) by J.M. Coetzee as an experimental form of autobiographical novel. Drawing on Philippe Lejeune’s theory of the “autobiographical pact,” the study explores how Coetzee both inherits and challenges the conventional conventions of autobiography through distinctive structural elements such as the disruption of linear temporality, the disjunction among the volumes and the active role of the reader in the coconstruction of meaning. The article argues that Scenes from Provincial Life not only inherits the autobiographical tradition but also serves as a genrereflexive work, where narrative structure itself becomes a strategy to interrogate the credibility, coherence, and representational capacity of the self