Declare Based On Books The Golden Notebook
| Title | : | The Golden Notebook |
| Author | : | Doris Lessing |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | Perennial Classics edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 640 pages |
| Published | : | February 3rd 1999 by Harper Perennial Modern Classics (first published 1962) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Classics. Feminism. Literature. Novels |
Doris Lessing
Paperback | Pages: 640 pages Rating: 3.76 | 18568 Users | 1588 Reviews
Representaion To Books The Golden Notebook
Anna is a writer, author of one very successful novel, who now keeps four notebooks. In one, with a black cover, she reviews the African experience of her earlier year. In a red one she records her political life, her disillusionment with communism. In a yellow one she writes a novel in which the heroine relives part of her own experience. And in the blue one she keeps a personal diary. Finally, in love with an American writer and threatened with insanity, Anna tries to bring the threads of all four books together in a golden notebook.Particularize Books In Favor Of The Golden Notebook
| Original Title: | The Golden Notebook |
| ISBN: | 006093140X (ISBN13: 9780060931407) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Characters: | Anna Wulf, Max Wulf, Janet Wulf, Molly Jacobs, Richard Portmain |
| Literary Awards: | Prix Médicis Etranger (1976) |
Rating Based On Books The Golden Notebook
Ratings: 3.76 From 18568 Users | 1588 ReviewsColumn Based On Books The Golden Notebook
Given up because although it was well written and the characters developed well early on, I just have no interest at all in the upper middle class who have angst and money instead of housework and jobs. They pontificated about sex and politics and other people's affairs when the rest of the country were out working and thinking of who was cooking dinner that night and whether or not tuppence on the tax each week was going to make school trips a bit difficult. Just not what I want to read aboutI created a new Goodreads shelf, "aborted," specifically for this book (& any future ones that I stop reading). Apparently it's an important novel & has been very influential, but I found it terribly tedious. 126 pages in, I found myself sinking into a foul mood: the characters are minutely analyzed but still feel remote, & the central conflict at that point (the beginnings of the collapse of hope & a sense of purpose among a group of Communist Party members), which would
I was discussing Flaubert the other day with notgettingenough, and remarked on how surprisingly different all his books are. Salammbô, as I say in my review, is completely different from Madame Bovary. La Tentation de Saint Antoine, which I'm currently reading, is completely different from both of them. But apart from Madame Bovary, firmly established as one of the most famous novels of all time, Flaubert's books are not widely read these days. You get the impression that people wish he'd done
I have considered reading this book for years. In 2007 Doris Lessing received the Nobel Prize for Literature for this book, forty-five years after publication! It was a book ahead of its time. The telling switches between different threads, stories and notebooks and also back and forth in time; I thought this would be confusing. It proved not to be! My hesitation was unfounded. The book demonstrates that a talented author can do that which for others would be impossible! I was not confused and I
This book is too often read as a feminist polemic, or as an exploration of madness, or as an overtly political story (mostly communist). That's not the point. The central character, Anna, an artist with a block, demonstrates through her attempts to keep life compartmentalized (her means of getting at the truth of existence) and a resulting breakdown that madness may be the only path to sanity. After all, nothing less than a complete breakdown is strong enough to tear down our artificial walls
Lessing herself came to view The Golden Notebook as a failure, and I think she was right. What she meant was that the innovation and experimentation she intended as the novels central point and raison dêtre was misunderstood by readers with an infernally stubborn insistence on wanting to figure out its theme, meaning, intent, and relevance to their own lives. Readers invested - and continue to invest - it with whatever agenda they bring to it in the first place, and interpret it conventionally.
I have to give this five huge stars. Even though I had problems with the last few chapters, this was never a chore to get through. I looked forward to reading it each day and enjoyed each of the notebooks, as different as they were. This is a feminist novel in as much as it's about female characters and their sexual relationships, but it's more of a look at mental breakdown, in a post war, communist party era. Masterful writing, as expected from Lessing and highly recommended.
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