Mrs. Fortescue (Masterplots II: Short Story Series, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Doris Lessing
- First Published: 1963
- Type of Plot: Psychological
- Time of Work: The 1950's
- Setting: London, a small apartment above a liquor store
- Principal Characters: Fred Danderlea, Jane Danderlea, Mrs. Fortescue
- Genres: Psychological fiction, Short fiction
- Subjects: Maturation or coming of age, Adolescence, Sex or sexuality, Prostitution or prostitutes
- Locales: London, England
The Story
“Mrs. Fortescue” is the story of a boy's sexual initiation. Fred Danderlea, at sixteen, is beginning to feel uncomfortable about his own emerging sexuality. Up until this autumn, he has had an easy, friendly relationship with his sister. Now she seems to hate him and treat him like a child from her superior position as a young woman no longer in school, free to go out in the evenings. Aided by the flimsy partition his parents have used to divide their room, he tempers his erotic dreams with visions of a lovely, tender maiden, his sister's alter ego, who redeems...
[The entire page is 1483 words long]
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