The pivotal event of J. M. Coetzee's second novel, In the Heart of the Country [published in the United States as From the Heart of the Country], is a cross-cultural seduction. Isolated and repressed since the death of his wife, a white South African sheepfarmer takes a desperate "lunge towards happiness" when he wins over with gifts, and finally brings into his own home, the young wife of his black foreman Hendrik. The act not only violates racial codes, but incites jealousy and madness in his devoted daughter Magda…. [Madga] shoots her father, disposes of the body, and throws open the farmhouse to Hendrik and his wife. Social codes are now further subverted as Hendrik rapes Magda, takes to wearing the "baas's clothes", and departs only when suspicious neighbours begin to investigate his master's disappearance. Magda is left alone….

This is the essential narrative, but in the novel...