Doris Lessing: The Golden Notebook (unabridged)
Read by Juliet Stevenson
Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook focuses on the deeply divided feminine psyche: political stance, sexuality, relations with women friends and maternal persona. Superbly read by Juliet Stevenson,... — The Times More…
- Release Date: 1st Jun 2010
- Catalogue No: NAX15812
- Label: Naxos AudioBooks
- Length: 27 hours 31 minutes
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Doris Lessing: The Golden Notebook (Unabridged)
- Recording Venue: Motivation Sound Studios, London
Free Women 1 – Anna meets her friend Molly in the summer…
Anna, in the face of this unspoken but clear determination…
There was a note of humorous, even childish pleading in this.
Now Anna could not reply…
Richard came into the room.
Meanwhile Molly, talented in so many directions…
Molly promptly went to the door, opened it, listened.
Molly ignored Anna and attacked.
Richard was on the point of exploding out of his chair…
Richard made a movement as if to get up and go…
Molly sighed, histrionically…
There was another sound, like a cough…
Tommy allowed them both a tolerant smile…
For the first time Tommy showed a touch of humour.
Anna closed her eyes a moment, smiling painfully.
Anna held herself quiet, with effort.
But at this Molly got up, and said quickly…
'But I think I'll mention three of the comrades…'
'And there's your friend de Silva.'
They kissed, briskly.
The Notebooks – The Black Notebook
(Opposite this was written:)
Yet I am incapable of writing the only kind of novel…
When I think back to that time…
For us, then…
About then I met Willi Rodde and got involved with politics.
But I don't want to write Willi's history…
The most striking of the three…
In this he was different from Jimmy McGrath…
Ted Brown was the most original.
The Gainsborough Hotel was really a boarding-house…
Willi ran a cheap fifth-hand car.
The main block of the hotel stood directly by the main road…
We were all very tired.
We did not return for a month.
June spent most of her time on the verandah…
Now it was Mrs. Boothby…
George Hounslow, a roads man, lived a hundred miles…
In parenthesis I must say that this is exactly what happened…
At about midnight, the glare of a lorry's headlights…
I've thought about that often since.
George looked at Willi, waiting for him to protest.
I remember George's long puzzled look at Willi.
At last we managed to get Jimmy on his feet.
We walked up to the big room through the hot sunlight…
On this morning Stanley had stacked the top of the piano…
Paul turned his head with his characteristic indolent charm…
'Anna?' appealed George, looking at me.
George looked at me again…
He shut his eyes.
It must have been about six or eight months…
And then there was the affair of George's son.
All this time we'd been making jokes…
Next day bad temper prickled through the hotel.
It was nearly midnight when Paul remarked…
I left Willi in the bedroom and stood on the verandah.
Paul left me and I went into the bedroom.
The Red Notebook – The second notebook, the red one…
The next day.
5th Feb., 1950
3rd Jan., 1952
I see that I wrote yesterday, I would leave the Party.
I went up to canvass, three afternoons.
Jean Barker. Wife oF Minor Party official.
The Yellow Notebook – The yellow notebook looked like…
Julia's last remark had struck a familiar note.
The idea for this novel had come to Ella…
Here was Dr. West's house…
Now the talk began again…
Meanwhile she was restless to get away from him…
It was time to go home.
Paul was late…
This was so personal, that it was her turn to glance…
Later – and not so much later, he would say…
They did not speak again until they reached the main road…
From the feeling of the house she knew it was still empty.
Being with Paul Tanner that night…
That night Paul was humorous and very tender.
The next evening they met full of defences on either side.
Five years.
The motif of Paul's attitude to his profession.
The end of the affair.
As for me, Anna, it was a remarkable fact…
They ate, and he looked over at her and said…
One day she went with him to his home.
Later that evening he said, laughing…
Ella had a dream which was unpleasant and disturbing.
The Blue Notebook – The blue notebook began with a sentence…
9th October, 1946
Jan. 19th, 1950
Jan. 31st, 1950
15th March, 1950
9th June, 51
28th June, 52
December 3rd, 52
9th April, 1954
Free Women 2 – Two visits, some telephone calls…
He sat down, arranged himself neatly…
Tommy lowered his head, sat frowning.
Tommy said: 'After I went to my father's office…'
This shock reached Anna's diaphragm…
She said at last: 'I know what you've come here for.'
Some time later, perhaps as long as an hour…
Now he came and sat down opposite her…
Marion, when she came in, smiled…
'Why don't you go to bed?'
The Notebooks – The black notebook continued empty…
'Oh, my dear, you are so marvellous…'
'Do you remember the excitement you talked about?'
Letter from Mrs. Edwina Wright…
'Anna, I liked your book so much.'
Now we are suddenly both very angry.
The Red Notebook – August 28th 1954
I dreamed marvellously.
Here were pasted in some scribbled sheets…
The talk became desultory…
'I often wonder if I am getting the correct advice…'
The Yellow Notebook continues – The Shadow of the Third
Next morning she slept too long…
His face, his full eyes, were momentarily immobilised…
And now she made a decision.
Near her a man was sitting, absorbed in magazines…
Her son woke her two hours later…
He had a bed-sitting room and a bath in an expensive hotel.
She thought this one out slowly…
Ella spent the following evening with him.
The Blue Notebook continued – 15th September 1954
It must be about six o'clock.
Now it is nearly eight o'clock...
And now I must hurry.
I ought really to be thinking over the coming encounter…
When I get off the bus…
Meanwhile Comrade Butte sits waiting.
There is a startled silence…
I read magazines and periodicals published in English…
Before I start on the 'welfare work'…
About eighteen months ago…
For a year I have been answering these letters…
I say 'Jack, when I leave, will there be anyone…'
And now I see his face has put on a stubborn closed look…
It is raining again, a small tedious drizzle.
And now the cooking for Michael.
I realise it is getting late.
Free Women Three – Tommy adjusts himself to being blind…
There never was a moment at which Tommy broke down.
It was expressed by the single fact…
A few days later Molly telephoned…
Richard's lips actually trembled…
Refusing to help him, not only out of dislike for him…
Richard with an effort took himself to his desk…
She opened her eyes, giddy and afraid…
Anna reached the cleanliness of her own flat…
Marion said: 'I'm sorry if I gave you a fright…'
She sat staring, serious, ironical.
'Do you remember that black leader…'
Marion left, creeping downstairs…
With which she went to the bathroom, to get ready for bed.
That was the dream she woke with in the morning…
The Notebooks – The black notebook now fulfilled…
12th November
In every direction, all around us, were the insects, coupling.
Suddenly Paul sprang over and trod deliberately…
We prepared for a lazy interval.
There was again an intense silence.
Time passed. We smoked. We waited.
Maryrose closed her eyes again.
'Look,' said Jimmy.
The right side of the black notebook, under the heading…
Came to know the young American writer James Schaffer.
Easter Sunday
Blood on the Banana Leaves
Here was pinned to the page a review…
The Red Notebook continued – 13th November 1955
The Yellow Notebook continued – The Shadow of the Third
A few weeks later, Ella sees Julia, tells her…
Next day she telephones Julia…
That evening Ella goes to Julia's house…
Ella finds this story inside herself…
About this time Ella pays a visit to her father.
Ella, alone in her room, looks into her private pool…
For something like eighteen months, the blue notebook…
I remember how she sat opposite me…
'What do you want me to say then?'
At this point, another thick black line across the page.
Telling Mother Sugar of this dream…
What is happening is something new in my life.
Another heavy black line.
Within a week of my having gone to bed with Nelson…
Well, from the moment Nelson came in…
It was quite late, as I've said, about midnight…
But now, suddenly, the tiny blonde woman…
He went off, shouting and screaming at me – at women.
I suddenly had a telephone call from him…
Later on in the evening he told me the following story.
In the morning I gave him breakfast.
Free Women 4 – Anna and Molly influence Tommy…
Molly telephoned, in a state of near collapse, soon after.
The stairs were narrow and dark.
Anna's voice cracked.
At this moment a sound from the foot of the stairs.
Anna went home slowly.
The Notebooks – The black notebook now abandoned…
The red notebook, like the black notebook…
Meanwhile our old friendship had been restored…
The yellow notebook continued.
*7 A Short Story
*12 A Short Story
*19 The Romantic Tough School of Writing
The blue notebook continued, but without dates.
I put myself back into the state of mind…
The American, Mr. Green, was coming today…
Saul Green came to see the room and to leave his things.
(From this point on in the diary, or chronicle…)
Spent today playing 'the game'.
I felt my stomach clench…
He has a way of being about at the time…
I wrote the last sentence three days ago…
I slept lightly, with terrible dreams.
Then we went to drink coffee, and we talked about politics…
I sat in the kitchen and thought over what I'd just said.
When he came back, I knew I'd been waiting…
Then the delight vanished as I came across an entry…
I've just been up to have another look at the diary…
Today he came in and I knew by instinct…
He gave me a quick, startled look and walked out.
He stopped in his striding walk around the room…
(*17) We have had a week of being happy.
He said: 'Come here' – moving away and gesturing…
Last night, when I had finished writing…
But now, writing it, and reading what I've written…
We began discussing the state of the left in Europe…
Then in front of my eyes I saw the letter…
Saul had not moved.
When he came down it was late…
I said to myself in my sleep…
And then I got up and switched on the lights…
After breakfast I took my shopping basket…
The Golden Notebook
As his feet went down the stairs…
Then the dream, or the sleep, became quite thin…
This voice faded; but already the film had changed.
I woke into the stuffy dark of the room…
I put on some early Armstrong. I sat on the floor.
I rang Molly's number, and I said…
And suddenly he leaped up and off the bed…
He was cold, so I held him in my arms, full of happiness.
I stood and thought…
As soon as the dream came on…
A short story: or a short novel: comic and ironic…
I cooked and we slept.
Free Women 5 – Molly gets married and Anna has an affair
Anna found that she was spending her time in a curious way.
One afternoon she went to sleep and dreamed.
Late that night the bell rang.
He returned to the table and remarked…
At last he said: 'Well, that's fixed. Another soul for sanity.'
In the morning she felt him deadly cold in her arms…
When Janet came home she found Anna…
