So, a couple things that really stuck out to me about the ending, besides the obvious baby revelation…

“‘How humiliating….to end like this.’” ‘”…With nothing. No cards, no weapons, no property, no rights, no dignity.’” ‘”Like a dog.’” (205)

It was like Coetzee took everything that he had been building up to this point – the parallels between the lack of dignity in rape, and David’s sudden weird affinity for Bev’s  fated-for-slaughter dogs – and underlined it all in red pen with this one conversation between father and daughter. And then he tacked on about a hundred exclamation points. If the parallels were vague before, then this made them inescapable.

Also, David’s description of Lucy on page 218 – “There is a moment of utter stillness which he would wish prolonged for ever….A scene ready-made for a Sargent or a Bonnard” really gets me. This, to me, is a prime example of how David has changed. When he first arrived at Lucy’s place, he was all, I HATE THE COUNTRY, whine whine whine. “Curious that he and her mother, cityfolk, intellectuals, should have produced this throwback, this sturdy young settler” (61) – implying that anyone living in the country is not an intellectual, etc. Even though a page later David does add that he is not ashamed of his daughter and her lifestyle, his disdain for everything unlike him and consequently beneath him – the simplicity of country life, etc. – is apparent in the way he talks and his attitudes. But the fact that he is able to see such raw and pure beauty in his daughter – even while carrying a rapist’s baby inside her – and that he recognizes that Lucy is in her element in the country – shows that David has softened a little. Life has knocked him off his pedestal, and he is able to see positivity where he did not before.