Nobel Literature Prize to Lessing

It's about time. "Doris Lessing, the Persian-born, Rhodesian-raised and London-residing novelist whose deeply autobiographical writing has swept across continents and reflects her engagement with the social and political issues of her time, yesterday won the 2007 Nobel Prize in Literature." (first paragraph from the New York Times article today)

Ms Lessing is best known for her series of novels Children of Violence , written in the 1950s and featuring her heroine Martha Quest, whose growth in consciousness reflected the author's concerns over social justice. Her first, semi-autobiographical novel, The Grass is Singing , addressed the culture clashes and racial discrimination she encountered during her childhood in Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe.

She was most influential with her 1960's novel, The Golden Notebook, which examined the multiple aspects of the life of a woman, Anna Wulf, in an experimental style. The feminist movement regarded it as a pioneering work. She went on to experiment with a variety of styles, publishing her most recent novel, Cleft, in January. She is 88 years old. The previous two winners were Orhan Pamuk of Turkey and Harold Pinter of Britain.