Doris LESSING wins the 2007 Nobel Prize for Literature!

BRITISH NOVELIST Doris LESSING has won the 2007 Nobel Prize for Literature for her “sceptism, fire and visionary power.” Lessing, a few days short of her 88th birthday, is the outspoken author of such novels as The Grass is Singing (1950), The Golden Notebook (1962), The Summer Before the Dark (1973), Memoirs of a Survivor (1975), The Fifth Child (1988) and Love, Again (1996). She was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for Fiction on three occasions for Briefing for a Descent into Hell (1971), The Sirian Experiments (1981) and The Good Terrorist (1985). With this win, Lessing has become the 11th woman to win the prize since it was first awarded in 1901, some 106 years ago, and the oldest ever winner of the prize. Though Lessing is one author whose works defy categorisation, she is best known for her exploration of the inner lives of women. Her latest novel is The Cleft (Fourth Estate, 2007). Her two volumes of autobiography are especially worth reading: Under My Skin (1994) and Walking in the Shade (1997).

Lessing has written and published some 54 books that straddle an array of styles and genres since her first novel was published in 1950. If you have not read any stuff by the Nobel laureate and would like to explore her ouvre, these, I think, are the books you should look for:

1. The Grass is Singing (1950)

2. The Golden Notebook (1962)

3. Memoirs of a Survivor (1975)

4. The Good Terrorist (1985)

5. The Fifth Child (1988)

6. Under My Skin (memoir, 1994)

7. Love, Again (1996)

8. Walking in the Shade (memoir, 1997)