Lessing, Doris

Doris Lessing (1919–2013) was one of the twentieth century's most important literary figures. She was a prolific novelist and short story writer whose varied output spanned a multitude of genres and resisted attempts at classification. Lessing was born of British parentage in Persia, moved with her family to Southern Rhodesia in 1925, and from 1949 spent most of her time in London. Lessing's first novel, The Grass is Singing was published in 1950. The Golden Notebook (1962) is widely recognized as one of Lessing's most important pieces of writing. Other important works include the five novels in her Children of Violence series (1952–1969); the dystopian Memoirs of a Survivor (1974); five science fiction novels (1979–1983); two novels published under the pseudonym Jane Somers; and The Fifth Child (1988) and its sequel Ben in the World (2000). She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2007