I would just like to quote one part for those of you who won't be clicking on the link:
"They're a very naive people, or they pretend to be," she added of Americans.
Lessing, whose novels include The Golden Notebook and Memoirs of a Survivor, also branded President George W Bush "a world calamity".
"Everyone is tired of this man. Either he is stupid or he is very clever, although you have to remember he is a member of a social class which has profited from wars."
Maybe I'll give The Golden Notebook another try. I dropped it after page 20 or so last time because I had about five other books I was more interested in.
2 comments:
Personally, I find it less "naive" than completely ignorant when a person stereotypes an entire group of human beings, whether it be a nation, culture, race, or otherwise, so I guess Doris Lessing is different that "Americans" in that respect. Although how spouting off such a simplicist view of the world at large is helpful to anyone is beyond me.
Well said, Lawson. I can see where she's coming from, in that in my [limited] travels I've gotten a few glimpses of what images of the U.S. get across to other parts of the world. But, all the same, it was a bold and simplistic statement.
I wonder from where the author of the original article pulled his quotes, if they were embedded in words less harsh. I'd guess not.
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