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Doris LessingA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Doris Lessing was born to British parents in Iran in 1919. Her family moved to Southern Rhodesia in Africa—now Zimbabwe—in 1925 when she was six years old. At that time, Southern Rhodesia had only been a British colony for two years. She lived there until she moved to London in 1949. Her father bought 1,000 acres of land in Africa to farm, but it was never very successful, and her family did not have a lot of money. She was sent to a Catholic boarding school and left school at age 14 to begin working as a nursemaid for children in other homes.
Lessing spent 24 years in Africa during her childhood and early adulthood. Southern Rhodesia was adjacent to South Africa, and Lessing’s experiences as a white person during South African apartheid provided rich material for the many novels and short stories she would later publish. Lessing and her work are a product of English colonialism in Africa and part of the canon of colonial literature, although Lessing participated in anti-apartheid activism and was later banned from both Rhodesia and South Africa. “No Witchcraft for Sale” first appeared in the 1952 short story collection This Was the Old Chief’s Country and again in the 1964 collection African Stories.
By Doris Lessing
A Woman on a Roof
A Woman on a Roof
Doris Lessing
Briefing for a Descent Into Hell
Briefing for a Descent Into Hell
Doris Lessing
Martha Quest
Martha Quest
Doris Lessing
Prisons We Choose to Live Inside
Prisons We Choose to Live Inside
Doris Lessing
The Fifth Child
The Fifth Child
Doris Lessing
The Golden Notebook
The Golden Notebook
Doris Lessing
The Grass is Singing
The Grass is Singing
Doris Lessing
Through the Tunnel
Through the Tunnel
Doris Lessing
To Room Nineteen
To Room Nineteen
Doris Lessing