Doris Lessing's The Golden Notebook

I learned about The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing when I was nineteen after I read Erica Jong's Fear of Flying.  Jong is my favorite writer and poet, and her work and life have inspired me throughout the past nineteen years.  I aspire to be like her in my writing and life -- fearless!

So why did it take me this long to read The Golden Notebook?  I have started to read it all the way through and am blown away by Lessing's prose and the story's complexity.  However, I did pick it up months after I finished Fear of Flying but put it down.  I have picked it up at various times but for one reason or another I did not finish it.

But now I am reading it voraciously.  Why did it take me so long?  Perhaps I wasn't ready for Lessing's masterpiece at nineteen or in my early twenties, mid-twenties, or early thirties.  Perhaps I needed maturity and time to grow as a writer and a person.  Jong's life is different than mine as well as her childhood, adolescence, and college experience.  We come from different experiences.  I can't be too hard on myself.  Or should I be?  I have read and  heard interviews from people who say that sometimes they were not ready for a book at a certain age or periods in their lives.  Has anyone else ever had this experience or read The Golden Notebook?

Literacy Begins at Home and During Childhood

I never thought I would follow a web site by Gwenyth Paltrow (though I do respect her as an actress), but a friend of mine encouraged me to check out Goop.com .  I did and was impressed.  Now I receive updates from  her postings.  Today's was about reading to children.

While in my neighborhood I do see children playing in the park across from my condo, it seems most children these days do not play and prefer staying inside to watch television, play video games, and sit at the computer.  Bad enough they are not getting exercise, but they are not reading, which is a bigger tragedy.

Having taught college-level freshman composition for the past eleven years, I am sad to say that it is a minority of my students who are bookworms.  Yet in my Anne Sexton seminar this past winter quarter, I felt I was in paradise because the majority of my students were readers, writers, and/or English majors.  Instilling a love of reading is the greatest gift a parent can bestow on a child.  Even if a child does not become involved in the literary arts, reading has such power in our lives.  It stretches our critical-thinking skills as well as our imaginations and knowledge.

My fondest memories are of my grandmother reading to me and my father and godmother offering me books during my birthdays, holidays, and sometimes just because.  Even in childhood my room was filled with books.

Bill and I want our babe's room and childhood filled with books and music.  Our baby registries feature books and CDs.  We also know that babies and young children are ripe for learning a foreign language.  The first one I plan to share with the babe after she arrives in August is Italian.  I am by no means fluent, but it will expose her to a language outside of English and help her when she is exposed to other foreign languages later on.  Neurons are making connections in infancy and early childhood, these connections need constant stimulation.

Parents and society needs to encourage literacy before kindergarten and keep encouraging it throughout childhood and the teen years.  The foundation is invaluable.  But even I can admit that while I love to read, my spelling in English still remains terrible.