Coetzee's Writing Style in his Waiting for the Barbarians

Received: 03 October 2021 Accepted: 22 November 2021 Published: 12 December 2021 DOI: 10.32996/ijllt.2021.4.12.7 The purpose of this article is to scrutinize Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians to discover whether, while writing the novel, the author uses the Rhetoric Triangle. That is, he uses ethos, pathos and logos. Ethos deals with credibility, the trust the audience has in a speaker or writer. Pathos has to do with any text or scene that arouses emotions on the side of its audience or readers, and logos has to do with reasoning when it comes to depicting or writing work. After the investigation, which has been carried out through the New Criticism approach, it has been found out that Coetzee uses the Rhetoric Triangle in the novel. However, all the three components of the rhetoric triangle are not ubiquitous in the novel. Unlike logos and pathos, which are used several times throughout the novel, ethos is scarcely used. KEYWORDS

In comparing Achebe's style with Tutuola's, Norman Mackenzie argues that: although Achebe has studied in British universities, the British public has preferred Tutola's writing style. This has mainly been because Tutuola's books are more imaginative and written in the pidgin English of Nigeria. Besides that, Tutola's books paint a lot of West Africa's folklores which are new and interesting to British readers.
Like Norman Mackenzie, when asked about her views as far as writing in African languages is concerned during an interview, Chimamanda Adichie, quoted in the same article mentioned above, stated what follows: I'm not sure my writing in English is a choice. If a Nigerian Igbo like myself is educated exclusively in English, discouraged from speaking Igbo in a school in which Igbo was just one more subject of study (and one that was considered 'uncool' by students and did not receive much support from the administration), then perhaps writing in English is not a choice, because the idea of choice assumes other equal alternatives. (Ngozi 30) Chimamanda argues that her use of English in her writing is not her own choice through this passage above. In fact, English was imposed on her since she was at school. As a result, she regrets that they were discouraged from learning Igbo at school. Besides Chimamanda, who has voiced her concern because writing in English was not her choice but imposed to her since school, Wali, quoted by Cecilia Amoage Eme and Davidson Mbagwu in their article entitled 'African languages and African literature', has posited what follows: He is not to discredit those writers who have achieved much in their individual rights within an extremely difficult and illogical situation. It is to point out that the whole uncritical acceptance of English and French as the inevitable medium for educated African writing is misdirected. (Wali 118) Through this quotation above, Wali states his disagreement as far as the use of western languages by African writers is concerned. He states that writing in French and English is wrong. According to Wali, instead of using western languages as a means to write, Africans should use their own languages.
Like Wali, who has voiced his concern related to writing in Africa, talking of Flora Nwapa's writing style in his article entitled 'To the Root / of Dear Cassava': Rhetorical Style in Flora Nwapa's Poetry', Obododimma Oha says what follows : Rhetorical style in Flora Nwapa's poetry seems to put these feminist linguistic issues, particularly the 'maternalization 'of style, to some test. Nwapa feminizes and maternalizes cassava (a crop/foodstuff), thus stylistically calling attention to both the m /other's role and suggesting the relation of the feminine writer to the maternal and the choric. (Oha 413) According to Obododimma, although Nwapa prefers to be labelled as an ordinary woman who is writing about what she knows, she argued during her interview with Marie Umeh (Nwapa 668), in this article: her writing has a feminist connotation. This is because, through the book on which the article is based, namely Cassava Song and Rice Song, the woman is singing her work. In other words, the woman is painted as a hard worker. In painting the woman in that way in this work, Nwapa shows that the woman is more industrious than the man. In disdaining the man when it comes to industriousness, Nwapa's writing has a feminist connotation.
As far as the completion of the work is concerned, the task will be carried out through the New Criticism approach. As stated by Klarer in an introduction to literary study: New Criticism concerns free literary criticism of extrinsic factors and thereby shifts the attention to the literary text itself… New Criticism does away with the use of ungrounded subjective emotional responses caused by lyrical texts as an analytical 'tool.' (Klarer 68) According to Klarer, whenever someone carries out an analysis through the lenses of New Criticism, the analysis does not have to depend on other factors that are not part of the approach. In other words, the analysis does not depend on other approaches such as psychological, social approaches to name just a few. The analysis will be done by taking into account the meaning of the text given by the one doing the analysis. As for the organization of the rhetoric, the triangle will first focus on ethos, second on pathos, and third on logos.

Ethos
Ethos has to do with the credibility of the speaker or writer. It depicts why the audience should trust the opinion or the information given by the speaker or writer(www.indeed.com). Thus, through this section, the task will be mainly to analyze J.M Coetzee's Waiting for Barbarians to determine whether he makes himself credible in his novel. In other words, does Coetzee use ethos in writing his work under scrutiny?
Talking of J.M Coetzee's use of ethos in his Waiting for Barbarians, ethos also has to do with the type of evidence the writer or speaker uses to be trusted or how the writer uses evidence to change readers' opinions. J.M Coetzee depicts barbarians' ways of life as follows: So I check my anger and do as the Colonel instructs: I hold his useless prisoners ″incommunicado‶ for him. And in a day or two, these savages seem to forget they ever had another home. Seduced utterly by the free and plentiful food, above all by the bread, they relax, smile at everyone, move about the barracks yard from one patch of shade to another, doze and wake, grow excited as mealtimes approach. Their habits are frank and filthy. One corner of the yard has become a latrine where men and women squat openly and where a cloud of flies buzzes all day. (‶Given them a spade! ″ I tell the guards, but they do not use it.) Grown quite fearless, the little boy haunts the kitchen, begging sugar from the maids. Aside from bread, sugar and tea are great novelties to them. Every morning they get a small block of pressed tea leaves which they boil up in a four-gallon pail on a tripod over a fire. (Coetzee 20).
A barbarian is a member of a community or tribe not belonging to one of the great civilizations. In the passage above, in describing the barbarians' way of life, Coetzee has started by using an adjective that fits the barbarians' character. The author has used the adjective savage. This adjective means a barbarian is someone who is not civilized. Gradually, Coetzee elaborates on what makes these people barbarians. As a matter of fact, Coetzee expounds on the barbarians' behaviours. They feel at home wherever they go. They do not have any place they call home. Besides that, they can customize any place with whatever they want. They can adopt any place as a toilet. They do not have preconceived ways of life. Consequently, they do whatever comes to their minds. Although they are in jail, a place that should entail sadness, they do not have any worries. They do not bother transforming a prison yard into a restroom. Accordingly, barbarians can ease in the open air without worrying about people around. They do not know the use of a spade when it comes to removing dirt such as manure or the fact that flies might cause diseases. They stay in any place that is teeming with flies without any problem. They are not accustomed to universal staple food such as bread. In a nutshell, through this passage above, in painting the barbarians' ways of life, J.M. Coetzee uses ethos while writing this novel under scrutiny. In other words, there is credibility in the way J.M Coetzee portrays barbarians through the lines above. He does not add other words that might hurt the barbarians. This wise choice of words to paint barbarians shows that there are ethics in J.M Coetzee's writing.
Like the passage above, this following passage features J.M Coetzee's use of ethos as well.
The girl is bleeding; that time of the month has come for her. She cannot conceal it; she has no privacy; there is no merest bush to hide behind. She is upset, and the men are upset. It is the old story: a woman's flux is bad luck, bad for crops, bad for the hunt, bad for horses. They grow sullen: they want her away from the horses, which cannot be; they do not want her to touch their food. Ashamed keeps to herself all day and does not join us for the evening meal. After I have eaten, I take a bowl of beans and dumplings to the tent where she sits. (Coetzee 75).
Through the passage above, one can realize the way Coetzee carefully uses pertinent words to portray the barbarians' habits and customs. This is proof of ethos in Coetzee's writing of Waiting for the Barbarians. As a matter of fact, Coetzee depicts the negative impacts of the period in the life of any man who associates with any woman in the period. Consequently, Coetzee argues that being together with a woman in her period has side effects. It causes bad luck in human activities such as farming, hunting, etc. The woman's period also entails poor harvest. As for hunting, any hunter who associates with a woman in her period is doomed to have a poor hunting party. In painting what occurs to any man who befriends a bleeding woman, Coetzee develops his description gradually. He first portrays the problem and later its consequences.
However, even though there is a scarcity of ethos in the analysis of the present novel by Coetzee, he is said to have ethics. In fact, Benjamin H. Ogden, in his dissertation entitled 'Coetzee and the problems of Literature' had what follows to state: My point is that despite the brilliance of Attridge's readings of Coetzee, and despite his remarkable vigilance in keeping alive the singularity of Coetzee's writing at every moment in relationship to its embodiment of ethical dynamics, it is still the case that the singularity of Coetzee's formal motivation is directed toward an ethical dimension, which has the effect of turning this singularity -to some extent-into something to be read in an ethical frame of mind. (Ogden 9) According to Ogden, although Attridge, who is an endless critic of Coetzee's writing, argues that Coetzee's writing does not vary, Coetzee's will be inclined to an ethical dimension. In other words, regardless of Attridge's argument about Coetzee's writing style, Coetzee's writing is teeming with ethics.
In conclusion, after this scrutiny related to Coetzee's use of ethos in Waiting for the Barbarians, it is worth mentioning that there is a scarce use of ethos in the novel. However, despite the scarcity related to the use of ethos in the novel, J.M Coetzee is credible given his literary career. In fact, he is very prolific and has been a recipient of an important award (John M. Coetzee Biographical,2003).

Pathos
In this section entitled pathos, the analysis will focus on the discovery of pathos(www.indeed.com). Pathos is used to arouse emotions on the side of the audience. It entails an emotional link between the audience and the speaker or writer. In other words, does Coatzee use words to tell any stories that arouse pity, sadness in the readers through his novel under scrutiny? In fact, in writing Waiting for Barbarians, when the author talks about a boy who has been put in prison with his uncle, he has what follows to say: The boy's face is puffy and bruised; one eye is swollen shut. I squat down before him and pat his cheek. ‶Listen, boy″, I say in the patois of the frontier, 'we want to talk to you.' He gives no response. (Coetzee 3) As human beings are social by nature, they share many things in common. Thus, besides sharing what contributes to their wellbeing, such as food, clothes to name just a few, they tend to share emotions, namely: joy, sadness, excitement, to name and so forth. These words would cause a feeling of compassion on the side of a reader. Thus, anybody who reads the way the scene is painted, the scene will ignite sadness in his innermost. This is because the words used by the author make a reader feel as if he is the one undergoing the pains described in the novel. Besides that, it is said that one of the boy's eyes is swollen. All the adjectives used in the passage above arouse pity for the boy. Consequently, anybody who is humane might burst into tears by reading what has been stated above. The passage above is not the only one containing pathos. In the following extract, J.M Coetzee also uses pathos in the novel as follows: The boy lies on his back, naked, asleep, breathing fast and shallow. His skin glistens with sweat. The bandage is off his arm for the first time, and I see the angry open sore it hid. I bring the lantern closer. His belly and groins are pocked with little scabs and bruises and cuts, some marked by blood trickles. (Coetzee 10) Like the one above, the author paints the suffering through this passage. Being naked, asleep, breathing fast and shallow is tantamount to being in agony. Breathing fast means someone is fighting for breath. To see someone about to die is a grisly scene that most people would not bear. Consequently, it would make people shed tears. The fact that the boy lies naked, asleep, breathing fast and shallow, causes pity on the reader. Besides the scene above, which entails pity from readers, there is a scene that a barbarian girl has been mistreated. Thus, when a soldier was questioned about what happened to the girl, he had what follows to state: I do not know, sir! Most of the time, I was not there. He appeals to his friend, but his friend is mute. ‶Sometimes there was screaming, I think they beat her, but I was not there. When I came off duty, I would go away. ″ ‶You know today she cannot walk. They broke her feet. Did they do these things to her in front of the other man, her father?
‶ Yes, I think so. ″ ‶And you know that she cannot see properly anymore. When did they do that? (Coetzee 39) This passage paints the torture a girl has been through. The screaming means that the girl is being abused. The girl's suffering does not limit to screaming. Besides that, she has been a victim of two impairments. On the one hand, she has her leg broken, and on the other, she cannot see properly. Reading the mentions would entail pity on the part of a reader because walking and seeing are part of the five main senses that a human being has to possess to live decently. Apart from what has been stated above, pathos has been featured through the girl's reaction to a soldier who endlessly asks her a question as follows: She speaks. ‶You are always asking me that question, so I will now tell you. It was a fork, a kind of fork with only two teeth. There were little knobs on the teeth to make them blunt. They put it in the coals till it was hot, then touched you with it to burn you. I saw the marks where they had burned people. ″ …‶ That was when the damage came. After that, I could not see properly anymore. There was a blur in the middle of everything I looked at; I could see only around the edges. It is difficult to explain. (Coetzee 44) The girl's reaction to her interrogator depicts someone at a loss for words because of something awful. Although people use forks when they are at the table, the fork with two teeth mentioned here refers to a spear normally used by fishermen and hunters. To see such an object made hot to burn people is a horrifying scene that no one would accept to see. Accordingly, seeing people burnt with that fork is a criminal act that would be fearful and pitiful for the victims. Albeit is not stated; clearly, the way the fork damages the girl's eyes arouse pity for an innocent girl. Apart from this part above, the use of pathos has also been depicted in the following lines.
'Look at his foot, sir, ″ says our guide.
The right foot is puffy and inflamed. ‶ What is wrong? ″ I ask the boy. He lifts the foot and shows me a heel caked with blood and pus. I detect a putrid odour even above the smell of dirty foot cloths.
‶How long has your foot been like this? ″ I shout. He hides his face. ‶Why did you not say anything? Didn't I tell you all that you must keep clean, that you must put ointment on blisters and bandage them? I gave those orders for a reason! How are you to travel with your foot in that condition? (Coetzee 80) The passage above shows how the barbarian boy has been suffering. Besides what has been stated earlier, the passage also paints that the boy's foot is puffy and inflamed. This displays the pains the boy has experienced. Thus, anybody who witnesses a boy in such plight takes pity on him. Apart from what has been stated above, the boy's heel is said to be caked with blood and pus. All this depicts the hard times the boy has gone through while trekking back the barbarian girl to her fellow barbarians. Besides what is above, Coetzee has also used pathos to paint the scene where prisoners are mistreated as follows: The Colonel steps forward. Stooping over each prisoner in turn, he rubs a handful of dust into his naked back and writes a word with a stick of charcoal. I read the words upside down: ENEMY…ENEMY…ENEMY…ENEMY……….
Then the beating begins. The soldiers use the stout green cane staves, bringing them down with the heavy slapping sounds of washing -paddles, raising red welts on the prisoners' backs and buttocks. With slow care, the prisoners extend their legs until they lie flat on their bellies, all except the one who had been moaning and who now grasps with each blow.
The black charcoal and ochre dust begin to run with sweat and blood. The game, I see, is to beat them till their backs are washed clean. (Coetzee 115) The extract depicts a pitiful scene and the soldiers' inhumane acts. Labelling people as enemies with a stick of charcoal and beating them so that the black charcoal and ochre dust begin to run with sweat blood shows that the prisoners were nearly beaten to death. This scene would eventually cause pain and pity on the side of anyone who might witness it. Given the fact that this scene depicts the beating and bleeding of humans, it causes pity and sadness on a reader. Consequently, the extract above paints pathos.
To conclude, after a careful analysis of the novel, there is the recurrent use of pathos in this Coetzee's work. On the one hand, several passages bring to light the egregious treatment barbarians have been through. On the other hand, it is worth mentioning that barbarians' treatments entail pity and compassion because of their gruesome character. After this investigation, which has shed light on the use of pathos in Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians, the search will be based on logos in the next section.

Logos
Logos is the logic and reasoning behind a claim made by the speaker or writer(www.indeed.com). Through logos, the author makes clear, logical connections between ideas and includes the use of facts. As a matter of fact, through this section, the article will focus mainly on the search for logos in work under scrutiny. In other words, does Coetzee use logic and reasoning to convey messages in his Waiting for the Barbarians?
While reading Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians, one can tell the use of logos. As a matter of fact, in this conversation between the narrator and Colonel Joll, there is the portrayal of logos in the following terms: There is a certain tone,' Joll says. 'A certain tone enters the voice of a man who is telling the truth. Training and experience teach us to recognize that tone.' The tone of truth! Can you pick up this tone in everyday speech? Can you hear whether I am telling the truth? This is the most intimate moment we have yet had, which he brushes off with a little wave of the hand. 'No, you misunderstand me. I am speaking only of a special situation now; I am speaking of a situation in which I am probing for the truth, in which I have to exert pressure to find it. First, I get lies, you see-this what happens-first lies, then pressure, then more lies, then more pressure, then the break, then more pressure, then the truth. That is how you get the truth. (Coetzee 5) Through this conversation, Colonel Joll teaches the narrator how to get the truth from somebody interrogated. Thus, to get the truth, as everything cannot be taken as truth, to get truth, the interrogator should stick to the three steps. During an interrogation, what comes out from somebody being interrogated is lies during the first step. After lies, the interrogator has the use pressure. During the second step, there is a recurrence of lies and follows the pressure of the interrogator. And during the third step comes lies again, and the interrogator puts pressure, finally comes the truth. In elaborating about these steps related to getting the truth, there are logos because there is reasoning which gets to the truth. Apart from the steps taken to the truth during interrogation, logos is also painted in the following conversation.
In this conversation between an officer and the guard of prison, the officer had what follows to say: First, when the boy's hands are better, I want you to tie them again, but not so tightly that they swell. Second, I want you to leave the body where it is in the yard. Do not bring it back in. I will send a burial party to fetch it early in the morning, and you will hand it over to them. If there are any questions, say I gave the orders. Third, I want you to lock the hut now and come with me. I will get you something from the kitchen for the boy to eat, which you will bring back. Come. (Coetzee 8) Through this extract from Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians, one can tell the use of logic by the officer giving orders to a guard of prison. As a matter of fact, to make oneself understood, the officer uses logic to connect ideas while giving orders. Thus, he uses different steps to make orders clear. To mention what will be done from the beginning, which is tying the boy's hands, he uses the ordinal number first so that the listener can know his first task. By the same token, he uses second to mention what the listener has to do after the first order, which leaves the body where it is. And then, he has to utter word by word to make his order understandable to the listener. Finally, to mention what the listener has to do after everything, which is to lock the hut since there were three steps in a row to follow, he uses third as well. The use of logic by Coetzee in his book under scrutiny does not stop at giving orders to a guard of a prison. Apart from what has been stated in this part above, Coatzee uses logos through this dialogue between the narrator and Colonel as follows : …You cannot rely on the soldiers to help you; they are only peasant conscripts, most of them have not been more than five miles from the settlement. The barbarians you are chasing will smell you coming and vanish into the desert while you are still a day's march away…(Coetzee12) As rhetoric is persuasively based communication, the rhetorician would like to move a listener from point A to point B through the change of mind. Through this conversation between the narrator and Colonel, one can tell that they use logos. Thus, to dissuade the Colonel from setting out for a mission that is about chasing barbarians, there is the use of cause and effect. To portray the use of logos, the narrator has first talked about the cause, which is the lack of experience related to the mission by the soldiers who should go on mission with the Colonel. And the effect is the failure of the mission, which is due to the soldiers' lack of experience. Consequently, because of that lack of experience, the barbarians will be able to smell the Colonel coming and then run into the desert. To continue in the dissuasion, through logos, the narrator argues what follows: '…They have lived here all their lives; they know the land. You and I are strangers-you even more than I. I earnestly advise you not to go. (Coetzee 12) Besides this passage above, where there has been the portrayal of logos, there is another one. In this part, there is the use of logos through syllogism. Always in dissuading the Colonel, the narrator has first talked of the fact that the barbarians have lived on the land all their lives. Thus, barbarians' familiarity with the land implies the barbarians' success in avoiding the soldiers. In contrast, the soldiers' unfamiliarity with the land justifies the soldiers' failure in the mission.
When a soldier who took a barbarian girl back to her relations was about to be hung, he had the following conversation with Mandel; the person had to hang him: I want to say that no one deserves to die.… I want to live. As every man wants to live. To live and live and live…(Coetzee130) Through this extract above, one can notice the use of syllogism by the author in this conservation between Mandel and the soldier who accompanied the barbarian girl back to her fellow barbarians. As a result, when the soldier, who was about to be hung, posits 'no one deserves to die', he means he does not deserve to be killed. In other words, he means no human deserves to die; as he is a human, he does not deserve to die either. In stating what is above, there is the depiction of logos.
Apart from what is above, logos has also been used through the conservation between Mai, soldiers and Mai's mother in the following terms: I love the big old stove you have here,' she says. It keeps its warmth for hours. Such a gentle warmth.' She brews tea; we sit at the table, watching the glowing coals through the gate. 'I wish I had something nice to offer you,' she says, but the soldiers cleaned out the storeroom; there is hardly anything left. (Coetzee 164) In the conversation between the characters mentioned above, there is the portrayal of logos through the words uttered by Mai's mother. By arguing that: I wish I had something nice to offer, Mai's mother expresses her incapacity to provide her daughter with anything nice. As a result, if anybody, who knows grammar, hears or reads Mai's mother's words, they can easily know what she means. Understanding Mai's mother's words are easier because the sentence contains logical reasoning according to the English grammar. As a matter of fact, the English grammar states that the use of past simple after wish expresses the fact that a speaker regrets something or that something is not as the speaker would like it to be.
After the scrutiny to discover whether Coetzee uses logic in his Waiting for the Barbarians, it is worth stating that he uses logos to make himself understand in work under scrutiny. The abundant use of logos is depicted by the fact that there are recurrent passages portraying logos in Waiting for Barbarians.

Conclusion
In general conclusion through this work, the purpose has been to discover if in writing his Waiting for Barbarians, J.M. Coetzee used the rhetoric triangle. That is to find out if J.M. Coetzee uses the three components of the rhetoric triangle coined by Aristotle: ethos, pathos, and logos. Ethos deals with ethics; pathos is the use of words that entail emotions on the reader's side, and logos has to be with logic in writing to convince the audience or readership. The scrutiny has been carried out through the use of the New Criticism approach. While applying this approach as the lenses through which the analysis has to be carried out, the researcher does not rely on other theories such as the author's psychological assessment, biographical and so forth. But, the scrutiny focuses on the meaning of the text according to the one who analyses it. As a matter of fact, this analysis has been centred on what the text means without depending on any other elements. After the investigation, it is worth stating that there is no equity as far as the use of the rhetoric triangle is concerned through J.M Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians. This Coetzee's work is teeming with passages displaying pathos and logos. As for ethos, unlike logos and pathos, there is scarce use of ethos as far as the rhetoric triangle is concerned. However, it is germane to argue that this work has not covered any topic of J.M Coetzee in his Waiting for the Barbarians. As a matter of fact, there are still topics that can be investigated, namely characters' relationship, the impact of Apartheid in Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians, the South African army's relationship with the Barbarians and any to name just a few.

Conflicts of Interest:
The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Resumé:
Le but de cet article est d'analyser l'oeuvre de Coetzee intitulé Waiting for the Barbarians afin de savoir si en redigeant ce roman, son auteur emploie Le triangle rhétorique. C'est -à-dire il emploie l'ethos, le pathos et le logos. On parle de l'ethos lorsqu'il y a la credibilité qu'un auteur ou un orateur a vis-à-vis des lecteurs ou la confiance que des lecteurs ont pour un ecrivain ou un orateur. Le pathos est employé quand un texte ou une scѐne suscite de la pitié ou de l'emotion de la part des lecteurs et le logos est employé lorsqu'on parle du raisonnement que l'auteur a pendant dans la redaction d'un texte. Aprѐs l'analyse de ladite oeuvre qui a été realisée par le biais de le Nouveau Crticisme, il a été prouvé que J.M Coetzee a employé le triangle rhétorique dans son oeuvre. Cependant, il a été noté que l'emploi des tous les trois composants de la réthorique n'a pas été equitable. Car, contrairement au logos et le pathos qui sont recurrents dans l'oeuvre, le ethos a été à peine employé.