RIP Doris Lessing

[Angeline]

Fable

When I look back I seem to remember singing.
Yet it was always silent in that long warm room.

Impenetrable, those walls, we thought,
Dark with ancient shields. The light
Shone on the head of a girl or young limbs
Spread carelessly. And the low voices
Rose in the silence and were lost as in water.

Yet, for all it was quiet and warm as a hand,
If one of us drew the curtains
A threaded rain blew carelessly outside.
Sometimes a wind crept, swaying the flames,
And set shadows crouching on the walls,
Or a wolf howled in the wide night outside,
And feeling our flesh chilled we drew together.

But for a while the dance went on -
That is how it seems to me now:
Slow forms moving calm through
Pools of light like gold net on the floor.
It might have gone on, dream-like, for ever.

But between one year and the next – a new wind blew?
The rain rotted the walls at last?
Wolves’ snouts came thrusting at the fallen beams?

It is so long ago.
But sometimes I remember the curtained room
And hear the far-off youthful voices singing.

~Doris Lessing, 1959

 

[Angeline]

Oh Cherry trees you are too white for my heart

Oh Cherry trees you are too white for my heart,
And all the ground is whitened with your dying,
And all your boughs go dipping towards the river,
And every drop is falling from my heart.

Now if there is justice in the angel with the bright eyes
He will say ‘Stop!’ and hand me a bough of cherry.
The bearded angel, four-square and straight like a goat
Lifts a ruminant head and slowly chews at the snow.

Goat, must you stand here?
Must you stand here still?
Is it that you will always stand here,
Proof against faith, proof against innocence?

~ Doris Lessing, 1959

 

[butters]

thankyou. i've never read these, so your posting them is a gift. now i want to read more from her pen.

 

[corndog_]

A remarkable writer and a wry wit-- from the CBS' obituary:

"[Lessing] was dismissive of the Nobel honor. After emerging from a London black cab, groceries in hand, she was asked repeatedly whether she was excited about the award.
"I can't say I'm overwhelmed with surprise," Lessing said. "I'm 88 years old and they can't give the Nobel to someone who's dead, so I think they were probably thinking they'd probably better give it to me now before I've popped off."

 

[Angeline]

thankyou. i've never read these, so your posting them is a gift. now i want to read more from her pen.

She's mainly known for her fiction. I read The Golden Notebook years ago and was so impressed with her writing--very intelligent but also real. An incredibly gifted writer and storyteller. She's kind of an investment to read but a rewarding one.

 

[corndog_]

.... She's kind of an investment to read but a rewarding one.

Don't you love that feeling?

Strong correlation with 12's denotation thread.

 

[Angeline]

Don't you love that feeling?

Strong correlation with 12's denotation thread.

I do. I get to read something wonderful AND pat myself on the back for sticking with it.

The trick is to sound direct but be indirect imho.

 

[Ashesh9]

She's mainly known for her fiction. I read The Golden Notebook years ago and was so impressed with her writing--very intelligent but also real. An incredibly gifted writer and storyteller. She's kind of an investment to read but a rewarding one.

Angie thnx for this salute to an intellectual who fought for Women's rights & for all oppressed peoples everywhere : what is the use of bein' gifted & talented if U do Not forge your undoubted Genius to improve the lives of the less Fortunate ?!?!? Doris Lessing RIP

 

[Angeline]

Angie thnx for this salute to an intellectual who fought for Women's rights & for all oppressed peoples everywhere : what is the use of bein' gifted & talented if U do Not forge your undoubted Genius to improve the lives of the less Fortunate ?!?!? Doris Lessing RIP

You're welcome Ash and I agree. The Golden Notebook, to me, is ultimately about freedom: of individuals, of communities, of groups of people. Lessing was a courageous writer and human being.

A few quotes from The Golden Notebook:


“We spend our lives fighting to get people very slightly more stupid than ourselves to accept truths that the great men have always known. They have known for thousands of years that to lock a sick person into solitary confinement makes him worse. They have known for thousands of years that a poor man who is frightened of his landlord and of the police is a slave. They have known it. We know it. But do the great enlightened mass of the British people know it? No. It is our task, Ella, yours and mine, to tell them. Because the great men are too great to be bothered. They are already discovering how to colonise Venus and to irrigate the Moon. That is what is important for our time. You and I are the boulder-pushers. All our lives, you and I, we’ll put all our energies, all our talents into pushing a great boulder up a mountain. The boulder is the truth that the great men know by instinct, and the mountain is the stupidity of mankind.”

~​

“Do you know what people really want? Everyone, I mean. Everybody in the world is thinking: I wish there was just one other person I could really talk to, who could really understand me, who'd be kind to me. That's what people really want, if they're telling the truth.”


Wonderful writing!