柯慈的《麥克.K的生命與時代》是ㄧ個關於南非黑人，麥克. K，的故事。故事中描述麥克. K不斷地受到南非種族隔離政策所帶來的遍所不在的壓迫與奴役。1980年代，南非的高壓種族分級制度分化了社會並造成對非白種人與下層階級人民的打壓，內戰的發生造成社會的動亂，各式各樣的集中營監禁著流離失所的人們。在他帶著病重的母親回她的出生地的路上，他們遭受悲慘的境遇，母親在途中病逝，之後麥克. K獨自漂流在路上，並一次又一次地被殖民的官僚系統監控於集中營。除了控制人們的自由，強力的權力結構藉由語言暴力來主宰並箝制著人們的思想，語言系統以形而上的架構奴役著殖民的「他者」，使「他者」被看不見的權力奴役而不自知。麥克. K拒絕任何形式的掌控，他遠離人群，躲進大自然並過著動物般的生活，進入一種無我的生存狀態。在這種微物的存在中，他對ㄧ切無所企求，因此達到了某種程度的自由。
作者柯慈認為殖民關係不僅僅只存在於南非，而是可能發生在任何人際關係中的一種普遍狀態。他的小說試圖從結構主義的觀點來檢視殖民主義，即，語言是一種殖民的工具和手段。本篇論文旨在探討殖民主義的手段和動機，這些分別展現在我對語言、權力結構，和自我與他者的二元論述的探討，並藉由主角麥克. K獨特的生存方式來討論逃脫權力結構的藝術：麥克. K對抗權力的藝術展現在他的沉默與園藝中。
麥克. K是一個超越語言的存在物，他頑濘的沉默使他游走於語言定義之外。他強烈的「他者性」拒絕被記載於歷史的呈現模式中，因此解構了語言系統。麥克. K與這個世界的連結建立在他和大地/大地母親的關係中，他在大自然中呈現一種忘我的、無時間性的「物」的存在，這種以消溶自我意識作為逃脫歷史巨耣的手段，實為一種生存美學的呈現，亦是此小說最特別之處。在麥克. K的園藝之中，他堅持默默耕耘土地，維繫人和土地的連結，認為只有這樣，人類才得以生存延續。

J.M. Coetzee’s Life and Times of Michael K is a story about a black South African, Michael K, whose experience of being dominated and enslaved by the omnipresent oppressive system and institutions reflects the atrocity of apartheid in the 1980s. The oppression of the non-white and the lower classes is foregrounded by the classifying system of apartheid, one that, with its autocratic fixity of meanings, divides races and classes. An unknown civil war causes dislocation in society and there are camps that imprison all kinds of people. On Michael K’s journey to Prince Albert is a process of being interned. In addition to the physical conquest of the colonized by the colonizers, this novel also demonstrates the metaphysical conquest of language. Throughout the novel, Michael K encounters other people’s desires to dominate him through language. Resisting being controlled in the camps and in the linguistic system, Michael K escapes to nature and lives in a minimal existence. In the reduction of his selfhood and subjectivity, he lives like a natural existent, and in this way, he is able to disengage himself from the slavery of human world and achieves some kind of freedom.
Coetzee does not perceive the colonial relations as merely exist in the South African context, but considers that they exist as a worldwide and ongoing situation that happens between human beings. His novels try to investigate colonialism from a structuralist perspective in examining language as a means of domination and negation. This thesis therefore examines what makes colonization possible. I explore not only the means of colonization, which is demonstrated in the discussion about the violence the linguistic device, but also the motivation of colonization, which is discussed by examining the split consciousness resulting from the dualism between the self and the other. Finally, I discuss Michael K’s ways of resistance against authority and the power structure of history in his silence and gardening. Michael K is an existent outside language. By being silent, he is able to disengage himself from being registered in the linguistic systems of meaning, hence evading the violence of the historical mode of representation. He deconstructs the verbal systems of meaning in his unrepresentable otherness. What connects Michael K to the world is his relationship with the land. He considers himself as a gardener and insists on the importance of keeping gardening alive. The idea of gardening is associated with human subsistence generally. It is in establishing the cord between man and nature that one can survive. Therefore, the gardening motif seems to provide an answer to the question of survival that emerges in all of Coetzee’s narratives. This is an ecological concern that confronts all human beings, whether the colonizers or the colonized.

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