Identity in Doris Lessing’s Space Fiction By David Waterman

Preface

Some time ago, I finished a project on representations of institutional violence, a study which included Doris Lessing’s Briefing For A Descent into Hell and Shikasta, re: Colonised Planet 5. Although I had read The Golden Notebook as a rite of passage at university, this was really the first time that I had examined Lessing’s work closely, and I knew it was not to be the last. The current volume is the result of my continuing interest in Doris Lessing’s work and in her position as a social critic and engaged intellectual. Like Lessing herself, the space fiction series Canopus in Argos: Archives, calls for a transformational, humanitarian politics of inclusion, but does so in a way that underscores the disillusion and frustration which must always accompany an ideal when it collides with reality, or at least what we accept as reality. It is not surprising if we have lost faith in society’s capacity to evolve: the history of governments and political parties, religious affiliations of all sorts, and scientific “progress” is more frightening that reassuring, showing very clearly that we have not yet escaped the infernal cycle of violence which results from our division into competitive, predatory groups.