Former UB faculty member J.M. Coetzee won the 2003 Nobel Prize for Literature. Coetzee is a renowned South African novelist and literary critic. He read at UB in the fall of 2002 and the Arts and Sciences Libraries' Arts and Humanities Team created physical and online exhibits in his honor and also organized and hosted a panel discussion of his work. Coetzee won the Booker Prize in 1983 for The Life and Times of Michael K and in 1999 for Disgrace.

Widely regarded as one of South Africa's most accomplished contemporary novelists, J.M. Coetzee examines the effects of racism, oppression, and fear. While addressing the brutalities and contradictions associated with the South African policy of apartheid, Coetzee writes from an apolitical viewpoint that extends beyond geographic and social boundaries to achieve universal significance. This effect is enhanced through his use of such literary devices as allegory, unreliable narrators, and enigmatic symbolic settings. <from Literature Resource Center >