The Golden Notebook (Paladin Books) - Softcover

Lessing, Doris

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0586089233 ISBN 13: 9780586089231

Publisher: Flamingo, 2002

Synopsis

One of Doris Lessing’s most important works, exploring politics, feminism, motherhood and the intellectual climate of the 1950s.

Anna Wulf is a young novelist with writer’s block. Divorced, with a young child, and disillusioned by unsatisfactory relationships, she feels her life is falling apart. In fear of madness, she records her experiences in four coloured notebooks. The black notebook addresses her problems as a writer; the red her political life; the yellow her relationships and emotions; and the blue becomes a diary of everyday events. But it is the fifth notebook – the Golden Notebook – which is the key to her recovery and renaissance.

Bold and illuminating, fusing sex, politics, madness and motherhood, ‘The Golden Notebook’ is at once a wry and perceptive portrait of the intellectual and moral climate of the 1950s – a society on the brink of feminism – and a powerful and revealing account of a woman searching for her own personal and political identity.

About this title

Review

‘At the beginning of the Sixties, this vast, frank, complicated novel helped to sustain our reputation for courageous, ambitious, experimental writing. Soon a worldwide bestseller, it is still her finest work. “The Golden Notebook” captured the heady mix of the early Sixties, when not just novels but political certainties were dissolving. The rising feminist movement seized it as a Bible.’ Malcolm Bradbury, ‘The Essential Library’.’ Mail on Sunday

‘Her greatest work...Shows the power of the female imagination at full throttle. It doesn't bear a simple political message but it does rip off the masks that women were accustomed to wear, and it shows up the dangers and difficulties that women encounter if they try to live a free life in a man's world...A landmark novel, a book that both changed and explained a generation...One of the finest writers of the century.’ Natasha Walter, Independent

Synopsis

Beautiful, striking reissue of this classic Lessing novel. Widely regarded as one of the most influential books of the twentieth century Anna Wulf is a young novelist with writer's block. Divorced, with a young child, and disillusioned by unsatisfactory relationships, she feels her life is falling apart. In fear of madness, she records her experiences in four coloured notebooks. The black notebook addresses her problems as a writer; the red her political life; the yellow her relationships and emotions; and the blue becomes a diary of everyday events. But it is the fifth notebook -- the Golden Notebook -- which is the key to her recovery and renaissance. Bold and illuminating, fusing sex, politics, madness and motherhood, The Golden Notebook is at once a wry and perceptive portrait of the intellectual and moral climate of the 1950s -- a society on the brink of feminism -- and a powerful and revealing account of a woman searching for her own personal and political identity.

Edition details

• Publisher: Flamingo
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0586089233
• ISBN 13: 9780586089231
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 576