J. M. Coetzee

South African and Australian writer and scholar (born 1940)

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Born 1940 · age 86South Africa

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Fame36.2
Momentum3.0
South Africa rank#2
Writers rank#150
Wikipedia26.7K

Wikipedia
96 languages
Cross-language footprint
Rank in South Africa
#2
Writers
Age
86
Born 1940

Summary

Updated 2026-05-29

South African novelist who picked up the 2003 Nobel Prize in Literature and somehow managed to win the Booker Prize twice. Coetzee's dense, often brutal explorations of power and complicity made him one of the most decorated writers in English.

Biography

About

John Maxwell Coetzee AC FRSL OMG is a South African and Australian novelist, essayist, linguist, and translator. The recipient of the 2003 Nobel Prize in Literature, Coetzee is one of the most critically acclaimed and decorated authors in the English language. He has won the Booker Prize (twice), the CNA Literary Award (thrice), the Jerusalem Prize, the Prix Femina étranger, and The Irish Times International Fiction Prize, and holds a number of other awards and honorary doctorates.

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