I really enjoyed reading "The Golden Notebook" by Doris Lessing. This is the second time I am reading it (after a gap of 7 years) and I felt I understood it better now. I liked it the first time, but I wanted to go over it once again, really carefully. Attempting to write about this book itself is very challenging for me. It is over 500 pages long and I think it is the most exhaustive expression of a woman's psyche. It was published in the 1960s and had a shocking impact on the readers.
The first time I saw this book, I got attracted to it by reading the blurb and also finding that it was on sale. I read it first in 2006, before the Nobel Prize for Literature was awarded to the then 87 year old Doris Lessing. So I read it with no major illusions or expectations about the author. About half way through the book, I was quite engrossed in the story and had to remind myself that this was written in the 1960s. It is one of the most honest descriptions I have ever read about the challenges faced by a woman and an author.
The book has a very different structure. It actually has a book within it and a flashback to the main story. The main character is a woman in her thirties, Anna Wulf, an author and a single parent. The book goes back and forth from the time Anna was a young woman in her 20s and her life when she is in her 30s. Anna Wulf has a whole gamut of experiences as an idealistic young woman in South Africa, as a modern woman in London trying to live life on her own terms. The story is told in terms of entries in Anna's notebooks or diaries in various stages. Anna is a successful author after writing one best selling book. But all of a sudden, many things start crumbling in her otherwise independent life.
South Africa forms the basis for Anna's communist leanings, and her ideas about love and life in general. Later as a mature woman in her 30s, she tries to come to terms with the changing face of communism, its place in the world and her own identity. She is also a single mother which was something quite challenging by itself in the 1950s. With the collapse of communism and increasing importance of capitalism, Anna finds herself questioning the traditional role of a woman and a mother. She also tries to pursue the ideal man in her life and in the process comes across her own weaknesses and strengths.
There are many stories within the main story of Anna Wulf in the Golden Notebook. Women and their internal and external struggles are the focus throughout the book. Doris Lessing is quite bold in her descriptions about the feelings and emotions of women at various stages in their life. I loved reading the description of real women in this book as opposed to the the false and often pathetically portrayed characters in many books. I loved the fact that Doris Lessing did not hide behind too many emotions to state the conditions of women in the 1950s. She was impartial in her observations about men and women and this is what makes her writing authentic. She was not trying to be a feminist, trying to strongly state something about women through her book. It appears as though she made strong observations about anything or anybody that really caught her attention. She was interested in the conditions of the people living in South Africa, the condition of women in the so called liberal London society. The description of places and scenes throughout the book is equally captivating. Whether it is the description of the South African landscape or the interiors of the London flat, her description brings the scene in front of your eyes.
I could go on and on about this book. I wish I could quote my favourite lines from the book too. But I just may have to read it once again and mark them. Another aspect of the novel that I really loved is her use of the 'notebooks' to denote the various stages of Anna's life and emotional development. I could actually relate to it. Women try so hard to play the perfect roles of a dutiful daughter, loving wife, responsible mother, that they lose themselves in the process. Anna tries to find her true self, separate from her other identities of that of a writer, a single woman, mother or lover. She keeps one notebook for each of her identities, one of the notebooks contains the story she wishes to write.
It is too easy to brand "The Golden Notebook" as a feminist book. It is finally the quest of an individual to find her true self. Anna wants to live a free, independent life. When she says 'free' she means that she wishes to live like a man without having to do things differently just because she was a woman. Back in the 1950s women were still not accepted as individuals. They had to stick or attach themselves to their roles in society. A woman who was single and wanted to experiment with her life was just not accepted. Doris Lessing has just tried to prove that a woman is just as influenced by her philosophies in life and has the right to make mistakes and learn from them. The story was written at a time when people were finding out the dark side of communism and racism, the devastation of war and the need for a new way of life.
The book can still be read and enjoyed today just to get inspired by the seeing how much our society has changed since then and to experience some brilliant writing by Doris Lessing.
The first time I saw this book, I got attracted to it by reading the blurb and also finding that it was on sale. I read it first in 2006, before the Nobel Prize for Literature was awarded to the then 87 year old Doris Lessing. So I read it with no major illusions or expectations about the author. About half way through the book, I was quite engrossed in the story and had to remind myself that this was written in the 1960s. It is one of the most honest descriptions I have ever read about the challenges faced by a woman and an author.
The book has a very different structure. It actually has a book within it and a flashback to the main story. The main character is a woman in her thirties, Anna Wulf, an author and a single parent. The book goes back and forth from the time Anna was a young woman in her 20s and her life when she is in her 30s. Anna Wulf has a whole gamut of experiences as an idealistic young woman in South Africa, as a modern woman in London trying to live life on her own terms. The story is told in terms of entries in Anna's notebooks or diaries in various stages. Anna is a successful author after writing one best selling book. But all of a sudden, many things start crumbling in her otherwise independent life.
South Africa forms the basis for Anna's communist leanings, and her ideas about love and life in general. Later as a mature woman in her 30s, she tries to come to terms with the changing face of communism, its place in the world and her own identity. She is also a single mother which was something quite challenging by itself in the 1950s. With the collapse of communism and increasing importance of capitalism, Anna finds herself questioning the traditional role of a woman and a mother. She also tries to pursue the ideal man in her life and in the process comes across her own weaknesses and strengths.
There are many stories within the main story of Anna Wulf in the Golden Notebook. Women and their internal and external struggles are the focus throughout the book. Doris Lessing is quite bold in her descriptions about the feelings and emotions of women at various stages in their life. I loved reading the description of real women in this book as opposed to the the false and often pathetically portrayed characters in many books. I loved the fact that Doris Lessing did not hide behind too many emotions to state the conditions of women in the 1950s. She was impartial in her observations about men and women and this is what makes her writing authentic. She was not trying to be a feminist, trying to strongly state something about women through her book. It appears as though she made strong observations about anything or anybody that really caught her attention. She was interested in the conditions of the people living in South Africa, the condition of women in the so called liberal London society. The description of places and scenes throughout the book is equally captivating. Whether it is the description of the South African landscape or the interiors of the London flat, her description brings the scene in front of your eyes.
I could go on and on about this book. I wish I could quote my favourite lines from the book too. But I just may have to read it once again and mark them. Another aspect of the novel that I really loved is her use of the 'notebooks' to denote the various stages of Anna's life and emotional development. I could actually relate to it. Women try so hard to play the perfect roles of a dutiful daughter, loving wife, responsible mother, that they lose themselves in the process. Anna tries to find her true self, separate from her other identities of that of a writer, a single woman, mother or lover. She keeps one notebook for each of her identities, one of the notebooks contains the story she wishes to write.
It is too easy to brand "The Golden Notebook" as a feminist book. It is finally the quest of an individual to find her true self. Anna wants to live a free, independent life. When she says 'free' she means that she wishes to live like a man without having to do things differently just because she was a woman. Back in the 1950s women were still not accepted as individuals. They had to stick or attach themselves to their roles in society. A woman who was single and wanted to experiment with her life was just not accepted. Doris Lessing has just tried to prove that a woman is just as influenced by her philosophies in life and has the right to make mistakes and learn from them. The story was written at a time when people were finding out the dark side of communism and racism, the devastation of war and the need for a new way of life.
The book can still be read and enjoyed today just to get inspired by the seeing how much our society has changed since then and to experience some brilliant writing by Doris Lessing.
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