Lessing, Doris (Vol. 6) - Lessing, Doris 1919–
Lessing, Doris 1919–
Ms Lessing, an English novelist, short story writer, poet, essayist, and playwright, was born in Persia and raised in Southern Rhodesia. John Wain has written that, "for sheer poise, I don't think there has been a writer to touch her since Jane Austen." Doris Lessing's two great themes are the shameful mistreatment of blacks by whites and the equally deplorable role of women in a male-oriented society. Although most frequently praised for her long fiction, this prodigiously talented writer has been called the most masterful short story writer since D. H. Lawrence. (See also Contemporary Authors, Vols. 9-12, rev. ed.)
[Doris Lessing] has tried to see personal and social conflicts removed from dry dogmatism, glib pragmatism, or unimpeachable but generally unworkable philosophies, and to gain an objective but passionate view of man by examining the "individual conscience in its relation with the collective" at those points...
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