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Yes, I believe so. It was just an introductory course, but students found it, as you say in English, an eye-opener.

White students?

White students plus a few black. We did not attract the more radical black students. Our approach would have been too academic for them, not engagé enough. We thought it sufficient to give students a glimpse of the riches of the rest of Africa.

And you and Coetzee saw eye to eye on this approach?

I believe so. Yes.

You were a specialist in African literature, he was not. His training was in the literature of the metropolis. How did he come to be teaching African literature?

It is true, he had no formal training in the field. But he had a good general knowledge of Africa, admittedly just book knowledge, not practical knowledge, he had not travelled in Africa, but book knowledge is not worthless – right? He knew the anthropological literature better than I did, including the francophone materials. He had a grasp of the history, the politics. He had read the important writers working in English and in French (of course in those days the body of African literature was not large – things are different now). There were gaps in his knowledge – the Maghreb, Egypt, and so forth. And he didn't know the diaspora, particularly the Caribbean, which I did.

What did you think of him as a teacher?

He was good. Not spectacular but competent. Always well prepared.

Did he get on well with students?

That I can't say. Perhaps if you track down old students of his they will be able to help you.

And yourself? Compared with him, did you get on well with students?

[Laughs.] What is it you want me to say? Yes, I suppose I was the more popular one, the more enthusiastic. I was young, remember, and it was a pleasure for me to be talking about books for a change, after all the language classes. We made a good pair, I thought, he more serious, more reserved, I more open, more flamboyant.

He was considerably older than you.

Ten years. He was ten years older than me.

[Silence]

Is there anything you would like to add on the subject? Other aspects of him you would like to comment on?

We had a liaison. I presume you are aware of that. It did not endure.

Why not?

It was not sustainable.

Would you like to say more?

Would I like to say more for your book? Not before you tell me what kind of book it is. Is it a book of gossip or a serious book? Do you have authorization? Who else are you speaking to besides me?

Does one need authorization to write a book? From whom would one seek it? I certainly don't know. But I can give you my assurance, it is a serious book, a seriously intended biography. I concentrate on the years from Coetzee's return to South Africa in 1971/72 until his first public recognition in 1977. That seems to me an important period of his life, important yet neglected, a period when he was still finding his feet as a writer.

As for whom I have chosen to interview, the answer is not straightforward. I made two trips to South Africa, last year and the year before, to speak to people who had known Coetzee. Those trips were not, on the whole, successful. My informants had less to offer than I had hoped for. In one or two cases people claimed to have known him, but after a little scratching it turned out they had the wrong Coetzee (Coetzee is a not uncommon name there). Of the people he had been closest to, many had left the country or died or both. His whole generation was in fact on the point of dying out. The upshot is, the core of the biography will come from a handful of friends and colleagues who are prepared to share their memories. Including, I would hope, yourself. Is that enough to reassure you?

No. What of his diaries? What of his letters? What of his notebooks? Why so much emphasis on interviews?

Mme Denoël, I have been through the letters and diaries. What Coetzee writes there cannot be trusted, not as