Coetzee, in the city from which he had emerged, a city that he’d intermittently written about—without revealing much of it—and then left, in 2002. The 86-year-old author’s legacy, I’d been told, ...

A Polish version of ‘Apocalypse Now!’ or a communist take on ‘Before Sunrise’? Or perhaps a modern adaptation of ‘The Wedding’ half a century before Smarzowski made his? Let’s take a closer look at ...