Disgrace

Disgrace follows the life and thoughts of the fifty-two-year-old protagonist David Lurie as he’s forced to face himself and reckon with his feelings about women, sex, race, age, and power after his sexual affair with a young student leads to his downfall. Set in post-Apartheid South Africa amid rapid societal changes, the novel also examines how David’s great resistance to change, particularly to passing into the later seasons of his life and therefore, as he sees it, losing his relevancy and sexual potency, contributes to his self-inflicted state of disgrace.