Time Bites: Views and Reviews

by Doris Lessing

Overview

“A generous and pleasurable collection. . . . Vibrant and illuminating, with quotable lines on every page. . . . [Lessing is] a superb essayist: lucid, wise, knowledgeable, and witty.”— Booklist

In this collection of the very best of Doris Lessing’s essays we are treated to the wisdom and keen insight of a writer who has learned, over the course of a brilliant career, to read the world differently. From imagining the secret sex life of Tolstoy to the secrets of Sufism, from reviews of classic books to commentaries on world politics, these essays span an impressive range of subjects, cultures, periods, and themes, yet they are remarkably consistent in one key regard: Lessing’s clear-eyed vision and clearly-expressed prose. But in its breadth and precision Time Bites is more: it is also a map of the human spirit and an intimate diagram of the mind of one of our greatest living writers.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780061967740
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	12/29/2009
Sold by:	HARPERCOLLINS
Format:	eBook
Pages:	384
File size:	522 KB

About the Author

Winner of the 2007 Nobel Prize in Literature, Doris Lessing was one of the most celebrated and distinguished writers of our time, the recipient of a host of international awards, including the Somerset Maugham Award, the David Cohen Memorial Prize for British Literature, the James Tait Black Prize for best biography, Spain's Prince of Asturias Prize and Prix Catalunya, and the S. T. Dupont Golden PEN Award for a Lifetime's Distinguished Service to Literature.

Hometown:

London, England

Date of Birth:

October 22, 1919

Place of Birth:

Persia (now Iran)

Read an Excerpt

Time Bites

Views and Reviews

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By Doris Lessing

HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.

Copyright © 2005 Doris Lessing
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0060831405

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Chapter One

Jane Austen

If there is one generally popular novel in the English language, it is Pride and Prejudice and this was true before a recent successful television version. It has always been taken seriously by the eminent in society and in literature: Jane Austen was celebrated from her first book, Sense and Sensibility. It is a very English novel, and foreigners have been known to question our admiration. Class and money! -- and where are the great themes of Life and Death? So come the criticisms, still, and the reply often is that class and money defined the lives of the novel's characters, not to mention the life of the woman who wrote it. So let us deal with these issues first, leaving aside for the moment the real themes of the book.

Jane Austen was a member of a network of middle-class families that merged upwards into the aristocracy, but her own family was poor. Her father, with six children -- two girls and four boys -- to feed and clothe and find careers for, had to take in pupils, so the home was for part of the year a school, noisy and full of rambunctious boys. Jane and her sister Cassandra felt themselves to be, and were often treated as, poor relations, dependent on presents, little trips and handouts from better-off and generous relatives. Not until -- late -- Jane earned some money writing, did she enjoy any kind of independence. Her situation was a common one then for poor unmarried women anywhere in Europe.

She has often been portrayed as a conventional spinster, partly because of Mary Mitford's unfriendly description of her as 'a poker' -- upright and judging. She was malicious -- this time the critic is Virginia Woolf quoting not very attractive bon mots at others' expense. She wrote her immortal novels in corners, always ready to set them aside to take part in tea and gossip. What do we have here? A woman of the kind I remember from when I was a girl, the unmarried maiden aunt, ready to be useful to others, without any life of her own, a pitiable figure. Austen was supposed, so we have often read, to be a sheltered woman, her experience limited to village life and a narrow middle-class circle.

Here is a quote from an article by a once influential critic, Demetrius Capetanakis, in the very influential periodical New Writing and Daylight for winter 1943-4 -- that is, in the middle of the war. 'Round every page of Jane Austen's novels one feels the hedge of an eighteenth-century English home. It is the hedge of ''sense'', of logic, or rather the logic of a person leading a secure life in the midst of a secure society. Jane Austen was protected by a hedge of unquestionable values . . .' Nothing could be further from the truth. First of all, her situation among the genteel poor exposed her: there can be few worse positions in society, even if often useful for the creation of literature. She had a close woman friend in the fashionable world, a cousin, probably Warren Hastings' illegitimate child, married to a French count who lost his head to the guillotine. The whole course of the French Revolution and its aftermath must have seemed as close to her as news from her own family. Her four brothers were often off fighting in the Navy against Napoleon, in danger, and afflicting their family with anxiety. Above all, Jane was enmeshed in the lives of female relatives and friends, who were always pregnant, nursing, giving birth to innumerable children who died then so easily and often. And, more potent as an influence than anything, Jane was sent as a tiny child to boarding school, and there was as miserable and neglected as Jane Eyre was at her school.

The triumph of Jane Austen's art was that the little piece ofivory she claimed as her artistic territory was carved out of such an abundance of experience and material. She excluded and refined. That means for people now who know even a little about that time, her stages seem confined brightly lit places where all around loom and mass shadows, dangers, tragedy. Nowhere in an Austen novel does an aristocrat lose his head, a woman die from milk fever or puerperal fever, or give birth to a mentally sick child, like her cousin Eliza. Pain and grief are cured by love, kindness and presumably kisses, though I cannot imagine more than a chaste kiss in an Austen novel: more and the delicate fabric, the tone, would be destroyed.

Jane Austen loved well and lost, young. He was Irish and he loved her too, and now it seems this marriage would have been made in heaven, but he was poor, had a mother and sisters to support, and so he must marry for money. This abnegation was understood by both sides. But she did love him, and he her, and the pain of it is, so it is generally thought, in Persuasion.

Later, when her single state was at its most circumscribing and difficult, she was asked in marriage by a neighbouring estate owner, who was rich, with a big house. The temptation was such that she accepted him, and the prospect of running an estate, being wife to a man of considerable standing, having children, leaving behind for ever her status as poor relation. But next day she changed her mind and refused him. This seems to me as sharp a glimpse into her mind as any we have. It is suggested that the memory of her love for Tom Lefroy made it impossible for her to marry anyone else. But it is useful to remember here that Cassandra reported Jane's moments of exultation at being free and unmarried. Free from what? Surely, childbearing. Again and again one reads how some cousin, or friend, has died in childbed with her eighth or . . .

Continues...

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Excerpted from Time Bites by Doris Lessing Copyright © 2005 by Doris Lessing. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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What People are Saying About This

Elaine Showalter

“In these pieces, we hear the tough, uncompromising... courageous voice that has made Lessing an icon for freedom of thought.”

Peter Parker

“Remarkably cohesive . . . one comes away with a real sense of who Lessing is. . . . [A] humane and truly internationalist book.”

Editorial Reviews

Arguably the grande dame of English letters-the list of her published works comes to 60-plus-Lessing has always been outspoken about literature, politics and social issues. The 65 essays and book reviews collected here range over those topics and others, all declaimed in Lessing's brisk, wry voice and articulated with pragmatic intelligence. Her literary reviews always amplify the book at hand; the pieces on Virginia Woolf, Leo Tolstoy and Jane Austen resonate with fresh insight. Her enthusiastic reconsiderations of authors who are little read today, including Olive Schreiner, George Meredith, A.E. Coppard and Walter de la Mare, may pique readers' curiosity. Another obscure book, about an American prostitute, comes to light in the fascinating "The Maimie Papers." Six essays discuss the writer Idries Shah and his books about the mysteries and consolations of Sufism, which, Lessing claims, were "like a depth charge" and fulfilled all her philosophical and spiritual needs. Not every reader will be convinced. There's a tirade against Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe (Rhodesia was Lessing's homeland) and a coruscating indictment of American complacency before 9/11. The main theme, whether addressed overtly or underlying her literary criticism, is the indispensable place of books in the life of an educated person and an enlightened culture. Hers is a clarion call. (Dec.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

From the prolific Lessing (The Sweetest Dream) comes this wide-ranging assortment of literary criticism and short essays that reads like the interior of a knowledgeable, insightful, and lively mind. Most of the essays date from the last decade, though one dates back to the 1960s and several others to the 1970s. Lessing comments cleverly on the classic novelists (e.g., Leo Tolstoy), but some of the most interesting pieces are centered on less well known or virtually forgotten writers. There are quite a few essays on the Sufi author Idries Shah (1924-96); other topics Lessing covers range from politics to cats. The only problem with this book is its format. Explanatory notes and original publication dates would have nicely fit at the beginning of each essay; instead, the reader is required to flip continuously to acknowledgments located in the final pages. In addition, an introduction to the collection would have provided a helpful overview. These issues, however, do not detract from the superb quality of the writing and Lessing's ability to provoke and entertain. Recommended for all public and academic libraries. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 8/05.]-Stacy Shotsberger Russo, California State Univ. Lib., Fullerton Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

Eloquent, worthy essays . . . At times it’s almost as if she’s flying alongside the narrative of the book in question, observing it, telling you what she sees. And what she sees is often exactly what is needed to illuminate the book.” — Seattle Times

“Declaimed in Lessing’s brisk, wry voice and articulated with pragmatic intelligence. Her literary reviews always amplify the book at hand; the pieces on Virginia Woolf, Leo Tolstoy and Jane Austen resonate with fresh insight . . . The main theme . . . is the indispensable place of books in the life of an educated person and an enlightened culture. Hers is a clarion call.” — Publishers Weekly

“[A] generous and pleasurable collection . . . Vibrant and illuminating, with quotable lines on every page. . . . [Lessing is] a superb essayist: lucid, wise, knowledgeable, and witty.” — Booklist

“Refreshing and invigorating... An invaluable collection..” — Los Angeles Times Book Review

“Lessing has a first-rate critical mind. Her social and political observations are acute.” — Miami Herald

“There’s much to enjoy in this collection of essays.” — New York Times Book Review

“Lessing seduces the reader into investigating her favorite books . . . Time Bites is provocative in the best sense: Agreeing with Lessing or not, one comes away with the sense of a mind fully engaged with books and the world.” — Columbus Dispatch

“Lessing is a passionate, generous reader and lover of books [and] the range of her literary interests is impressively wide. . . . In these pieces, we hear the tough, uncompromising, direct and courageous voice that has made Lessing an icon for freedom of thought around the world.” — Elaine Showalter, Times Literary Supplement (London)

“Running through each essay is a passionate belief that humans can overcome our tendencies for ignorance and cruelty if we apply our minds compassionately to the task . . . [Lessing] possesses the open-minded curiosity of an autodidact.” — Denver Post

“This book is remarkably cohesive, and one comes away with a real sense of who Lessing is and what she believes. Even when tackling complex subjects, she writes almost casually, with a conversation-like directness . . . [A] humane and truly internationalist book.” — Peter Parker, Sunday Times (London)

“Each of these pieces is worth reading, and indeed re-reading, in its own right but, as an added boon, they also enrich our understanding of Lessing’s own fiction . . . The writing is full of that sympathy for the human condition that informs her fiction and there is something thought-provoking on every page. Lessing’s prose is always penetrating.” — The Times (London)

“From Sufism to Mugabe, from cats to Ecclesiastes, there is something here for everyone. As in the broad-ranging empathy of her fiction, Lessing is not a fussy stylist; her overriding concern is to get to the heart of matter . . . If there is an underlying theme to Time Bites [then] it is the primacy of reading. Here is Lessing the clear-eyed reader on Bulgakov, Stead, Schreiner, de Beauvoir, Stendhal.” — Daily Telegraph (London)

“Takes your breath away with its simple audacity . . . Time Bites is full of [Lessing’s] endless passion for books . . . On writers and writing, on the importance of books in Africa and elsewhere and on the relentless and terrible wash of history, how it drowns and erodes its victims and on the importance of the human voice, human learning, acquired wisdom, we glimpse Lessing’s natural authority.” — Glasgow Herald

“Lessing’s is one of those apparently effortless but graceful styles, which is capable of delivering a comic image of perfect brilliance.” — The Guardian

“[Lessing has] a keen sociological eye for class and ideology; an understanding of the contradictory impulses of the human hearty; an ability to conjure a place, a mood and a time through seemingly matter-of-fact descriptions.” — Michiko Kakutani, New York Times

“Lessing anchors the self in the world and returns the world to the self. In this, she is a daughter of Dickens, of Zola, of Stendhal: profoundly radical and traditional at once, in the best sense of each word.” — Susie Linfield, Washington Post Book World

“Here is yet more evidence that this writer of enormous insight and prodigious talent should have won the Nobel Prize decades ago.” — Chicago Tribune

“To read Lessing, now in her 80s, is to watch an Old Master at work. She sets the scene instantly, viscerally and explores the folds and recesses of character with astonishing economy.” — Boston Globe

“Absorbing … vivid and fresh … Lessing again demonstrates her remarkable social ventriloquism, an ability to convincingly project her voice into a disparate range of milieus and characters.” — Los Angeles Times

“Lessing’s scathing intelligence ranges widely… each [short novel ] unfolds over decades, tracking with dispassionate precision how youthful notions come to define, even defeat, a life.” — The New Yorker

“Stunning … showing Lessing’s trademark incisiveness.” — Vogue

“Lessing has never been one to hide the truth, no matter how damning or devastating, and [THE GRANDMOTHERS] shows that her perceptions of the human condition have certainly not been dulled by age or by fame. She continues to be an incisive chronicler of our times and a wickedly honest storyteller.” — New Orleans Times-Picayune

“Doris Lessing is a compelling storyteller with a fierce intelligence, a keen ear for hypocricy and a sure grasp of history’s cruel ironies.” — Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

“Intensely readable … [Lessing] offers startling perspectives on domesticity and desire.” — O magazine

“At once intimately detailed yet infinitely expansive in their suggestions of a lost world only recoverable by a profoundly observant writer ….Showing [Lessing] at the top of her very impressive form.” — Publishers Weekly

“A brilliantly written book … Lessing is at the top of her game.” — Library Journal (starred)

“In these pieces, we hear the tough, uncompromising . . . courageous voice that has made Lessing an icon for freedom of thought.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred)

“A clarion call . . . Declaimed in Lessing’s brisk, wry voice and articulated with pragmatic intelligence.” — Publishers Weekly

“In these pieces, we hear the tough, uncompromising... courageous voice that has made Lessing an icon for freedom of thought.” — Elaine Showalter, Times Literary Supplement (London)

“Remarkably cohesive . . . one comes away with a real sense of who Lessing is. . . . [A] humane and truly internationalist book.” — Peter Parker, Sunday Times (London)

“Eloquent, worthy essays.” — Seattle Times

From the Publisher

[A] generous and pleasurable collection . . . Vibrant and illuminating, with quotable lines on every page. . . . [Lessing is] a superb essayist: lucid, wise, knowledgeable, and witty.

Booklist

Lessing seduces the reader into investigating her favorite books . . . Time Bites is provocative in the best sense: Agreeing with Lessing or not, one comes away with the sense of a mind fully engaged with books and the world.

Columbus Dispatch

There’s much to enjoy in this collection of essays.

New York Times Book Review

Eloquent, worthy essays . . . At times it’s almost as if she’s flying alongside the narrative of the book in question, observing it, telling you what she sees. And what she sees is often exactly what is needed to illuminate the book.

Seattle Times

Running through each essay is a passionate belief that humans can overcome our tendencies for ignorance and cruelty if we apply our minds compassionately to the task . . . [Lessing] possesses the open-minded curiosity of an autodidact.

Denver Post

Refreshing and invigorating... An invaluable collection..

Los Angeles Times Book Review

Lessing has a first-rate critical mind. Her social and political observations are acute.

Miami Herald

Doris Lessing is a compelling storyteller with a fierce intelligence, a keen ear for hypocricy and a sure grasp of history’s cruel ironies.

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Lessing’s is one of those apparently effortless but graceful styles, which is capable of delivering a comic image of perfect brilliance.

The Guardian

Absorbing … vivid and fresh … Lessing again demonstrates her remarkable social ventriloquism, an ability to convincingly project her voice into a disparate range of milieus and characters.

|Los Angeles Times

From Sufism to Mugabe, from cats to Ecclesiastes, there is something here for everyone. As in the broad-ranging empathy of her fiction, Lessing is not a fussy stylist; her overriding concern is to get to the heart of matter . . . If there is an underlying theme to Time Bites [then] it is the primacy of reading. Here is Lessing the clear-eyed reader on Bulgakov, Stead, Schreiner, de Beauvoir, Stendhal.

Daily Telegraph (London)

[Lessing has] a keen sociological eye for class and ideology; an understanding of the contradictory impulses of the human hearty; an ability to conjure a place, a mood and a time through seemingly matter-of-fact descriptions.

Michiko Kakutani

Lessing’s scathing intelligence ranges widely… each [short novel ] unfolds over decades, tracking with dispassionate precision how youthful notions come to define, even defeat, a life.

The New Yorker

Remarkably cohesive . . . one comes away with a real sense of who Lessing is. . . . [A] humane and truly internationalist book.

Peter Parker

Takes your breath away with its simple audacity . . . Time Bites is full of [Lessing’s] endless passion for books . . . On writers and writing, on the importance of books in Africa and elsewhere and on the relentless and terrible wash of history, how it drowns and erodes its victims and on the importance of the human voice, human learning, acquired wisdom, we glimpse Lessing’s natural authority.

Glasgow Herald

In these pieces, we hear the tough, uncompromising... courageous voice that has made Lessing an icon for freedom of thought.

Elaine Showalter

Here is yet more evidence that this writer of enormous insight and prodigious talent should have won the Nobel Prize decades ago.

Chicago Tribune

Lessing has never been one to hide the truth, no matter how damning or devastating, and [THE GRANDMOTHERS] shows that her perceptions of the human condition have certainly not been dulled by age or by fame. She continues to be an incisive chronicler of our times and a wickedly honest storyteller.

New Orleans Times-Picayune

Lessing anchors the self in the world and returns the world to the self. In this, she is a daughter of Dickens, of Zola, of Stendhal: profoundly radical and traditional at once, in the best sense of each word.

Susie Linfield

To read Lessing, now in her 80s, is to watch an Old Master at work. She sets the scene instantly, viscerally and explores the folds and recesses of character with astonishing economy.

Boston Globe

Each of these pieces is worth reading, and indeed re-reading, in its own right but, as an added boon, they also enrich our understanding of Lessing’s own fiction . . . The writing is full of that sympathy for the human condition that informs her fiction and there is something thought-provoking on every page. Lessing’s prose is always penetrating.

The Times (London)

Intensely readable … [Lessing] offers startling perspectives on domesticity and desire.

O magazine

Stunning … showing Lessing’s trademark incisiveness.

Vogue

Lessing’s scathing intelligence ranges widely… each [short novel ] unfolds over decades, tracking with dispassionate precision how youthful notions come to define, even defeat, a life.

The New Yorker

Refreshing and invigorating... An invaluable collection..

Los Angeles Times Book Review

Here is yet more evidence that this writer of enormous insight and prodigious talent should have won the Nobel Prize decades ago.

Chicago Tribune

Absorbing … vivid and fresh … Lessing again demonstrates her remarkable social ventriloquism, an ability to convincingly project her voice into a disparate range of milieus and characters.

Los Angeles Times

Lessing has a first-rate critical mind. Her social and political observations are acute.

Miami Herald

[A] generous and pleasurable collection . . . Vibrant and illuminating, with quotable lines on every page. . . . [Lessing is] a superb essayist: lucid, wise, knowledgeable, and witty.

Booklist