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The Golden Notebook

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The Golden Notebook

By: Doris Lessing
Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
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About this listen

One of the most important books of the growing feminist movement of the 1950s, The Golden Notebook was brought to the attention of a wider public by the Nobel Prize award to Doris Lessing in 2007.

Author Anna Wulf attempts to overcome writer’s block by writing a comprehensive "golden notebook" that draws together the preoccupations of her life, each of which is examined in a different notebook: sources of her creative inspiration in a black book, communism in a red book, the breakdown of her marriage in a yellow book, and day-to-day emotions and dreams in a blue book. Anna’s struggle to unify the various strands of her life – emotional, political, and professional – amasses into a fascinating encyclopaedia of female experience in the ‘50s.

In this authentic, taboo-breaking novel, Lessing brings the plight of women’s lives from obscurity behind closed doors into broad daylight. The Golden Notebook resonates with the concerns and experiences of a great many women and is a true modern classic, thoroughly deserving of its reputation as a feminist bible. A notoriously long and complex work, it is given a new life by this – its first unabridged recording.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your My Library section along with the audio.

©1962 Doris Lessing (P)2010 Naxos Audiobook
Classics Emotions Thought-Provoking Fiction

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Critic reviews

" The Golden Notebook is Doris Lessing’s most important work and has left its mark upon the ideas and feelings of a whole generation of women." (Elizabeth Hardwick, New York Times Book Review)
All stars
Most relevant
delightful at times, painful most of the time. well worth a listen, but I was glad when I finally heard audible's hope..
Juliet Stevenson helps with soldiering through it all.

it's all very odd, isn't?

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Still as fresh and thought provoking as it ever was. Ravishing performances from Juliet Stevenson
I urge every adult human being, especially those of us who write fiction, to immerse yourself in this really quite disturbing experience.
I'm not the same person I was when I first downloaded the book and began listening- the mark of great fiction

Superb and challenging classic novel

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Dont try this as a bedtime read unless you’re desperate to fall asleep almost immediately !

Difficult !

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A wonderfully perceptive writer, Lessing captures the nuances of dialogue and emotion brilliantly. I at several points had to stop and think about the writer's ability to create such brilliant authenticity in fiction. The central character, Anna, is presented with such subtlety and complexity that her thoughts on sexual politics, relationships and frustrated desires become immediately gripping. The narration by Juliet Stevenson enlivens the prose of this book and gives the perfect voice to Anna.

Beautifully Perceptive

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If I'd tried to get through this in print I definitely wouldn't have got managed it but Juliet Stevenson is SUCH a good actress that it held my attention enough and I'm glad it did but I didn't fully like it.

It's beautifully written and contains real insight. Certain sections and vignettes are astounding. I have no doubt that when it was published (1962) it was a revelation as it deals with the inner lives of modern women - having lots of casual sex, talking about tampons, being communists, critical of colonialism etc but dear god...

The women are frustratingly wet, especially in their relations with men....every single one of whom is an absolute thundering d!ckhead. The feeling it left me with is exhaustion.

Glad I read it, glad I won't have to again.

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i admire Doris Lessing's ability to describe the feelings and thoughts ef women (and men). and her description of the psychological and psychiatric breakdowns is absolutely masterful.

Masterful!

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Intense and beautifully performed. A little more focus on the African theme would have been nice

More Lessing

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Well this is a book about navel gazing. Not my thing. But beautifully written and performed.
The level of introspection was profound to a point of mental health concerns and beyond.

Very very long

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A refreshingly candid examination of the mismatch of the sexes. Brutal at times, longing, searching and often bleak. Brilliantly observed and deafeningly hopeless. I'm left wondering if things have changed or whether they are just better masked.

An examination of the sexual politics of her time.

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A long nasty story, full of nasty characters and nasty
intimate details with plenty of nasty cruelty thrown in.
Well read and performed by Juliet Stevenson. I hope she
was well paid for her endurance.

The ugly side of humanity

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