The First Line

The book disgrace opens with the line "For a man of his age, fifty-two, divorced, he has, to his mind, solved the problem of sex rather well." This line is a very significant one and is the readers first glimps into the thinking of the principal character David Lurie with regards to sex which is a mjor theme in this novel. Further reading of the novel helps the reader understand why the character would make this statement, because he is shown to be a womanizer with a history of bad relations. He is twice divorced and admits to even having no problem with sleeping with his colleagues'wives and he eventually has an affair with a student. The reader can interpret that David Lurie's problem with sex is that it generally involves a woman which to his mind brings many emotional complications and unwanted passions and his distaste for this is seen in his desire to be left alone after sex and not be bothered. The context of this quote is when he is visiting a prostitute so for him the solution to sex is for it to occur weekly for 90 minutes and involve as little emotion as possible, being purely business, although he begrudgingly does end up feeling affection which is not reciprocated. His feelings for the prostitute Soraya show that he is unsuccesful in achieving his goal of sex free from emotions and these feelings eventually chase Soraya away from him in search of less attached clientelle perhaps.