Alfred and Emily

Tough to categorize this one. It begins as a novel, which Lessing says she wrote to give her parents an alternate life to the damaged one they lived. She sets us up with a Foreword, in which she explains that WWI and its aftereffects hung over her own life well into adulthood, as a result of what it did, physically and emotionally, to her father and mother. What follows is a fine short novel, in which Alfred and Emily do not marry, and the Great War never happens. By inference, of course, Lessing does not exist in this version of their lives. Somewhat abruptly, this story comes to a close, and for the second half of the book Lessing reflects on what did happen after Alfred lost a leg to shrapnel (thereby escaping certain death with his show more unit days later at Passchendaelle), married Emily, and eventually took her and their children off to Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) to establish a farm which he hoped would make his fortune. Lessing examines her difficult relationship with her mother, ponders the advances in medicine and mental health care that could have improved life for both Alfred and Emily, and embraces her childhood in Africa despite its hardships. She also comments on the effects of colonialism, racism, the second World War and global politics. This seems to have been her last published work, and the memoir section has an end-of-life feel about it, as if the author had finally come to terms with some heavy matters that had troubled her most of her life. A worthwhile, if sometimes confusing read. show less

The premise and hybrid structure of Alfred and Emily is potentially quite intriguing. In one half of the book, celebrated author Doris Lessing produces a memoir of growing up on a small farm in Rhodesia during the years between the two world wars. The ostensible purpose of this narrative is to tell the true stories of her parents, both of whom had been beaten down—physically, mentally, emotionally—by myriad circumstances at that point in their lives. In the other half of the book, Lessing creates a fictional alternative story for Emily and Alfred in which the Great War does not rob them of their vitality and purpose. However, in this imagined tale, her parents are nothing more than life-long friends who are married to other people show more and who follow very different paths. So, the alternate vision the author produces is one in which she herself would not have existed!

The problem I had with this literary exercise is that absolutely none of it was either interesting or engaging. The author made the curious decision to tell the fictional version of her parents’ story first, rather than letting the reader become familiar with the sad and frustrating reality of their true journey. There is a growing movement in modern literature to redeem an otherwise lamentable situation through fiction (e.g., Ian McEwan’s Atonement, Margaret Atwood’s The Blind Assassin), but you really have to understand the original circumstances before an attempt at redemption makes sense. Thus, the author’s sequencing choice was a real misstep. More importantly, though, both versions of the saga are almost wholly devoid of warmth and the events described are unlikely to resonate with a reader not already acquainted with the family. By the end of the book, the overwhelming impression is that this was something the author needed to write for therapeutic reasons (particularly with respect to her considerable mother issues), but that did not make for a rewarding reading experience. show less

A combination novella/memoir, the first half about what her parents' lives would have been like if not for World War I, the second, the reality. Like everyone else who lived through that time, their lives were pretty well ruined by the war.

I liked the novella - she didn't give them perfect lives, but real ones that included regret and ambiguity. The memoir section was interesting too, about their life on a farm in Rhodesia. Her mother imagined it would be like Happy Valley in Kenya, and it wasn't; the farm was small and pretty much a failure, and her father developed diabetes (he'd already lost a leg in the war) and died fairly young. Much of this part is about how Lessing's mother tried to live through her children and to control them, show more a theme I think a lot of us can relate to.

I don't think I've ever read anything by Doris Lessing before; I think of her as writing dense political books, but this is a wonderful story. I believe it isn't typical of her writing but maybe I'll try some of her other books. show less

"The Great War, the war that would end all war, squatted over my childhood."
By sally tarbox on 31 Jan. 2015
Format: Paperback
Doris Lessing, brought up on an African farm, in what seems quite a tough lifestyle, reminisces on her parents.
Both were British: her mother went against her father's plans for her to go to university, becoming a nurse instead. And her sporty, outdoors father was wrecked in the Great War. Their thoughts of a money-making farm in Rhodesia were doomed to failure....
In the first half of the novel, the author imagines a whole different story for them, if they had taken different paths. Her mother, devoting herself to social work (though interestingly, still not happy); her father healthy, married to someone else...
Then show more in the second half she takes us into what their real lives were like - the disappointment, the memories. She recalls dressing the dog in her mother's gorgeous but moth-eaten dinner gowns - emblems of a world she would never know again. And with the wisdom of old age she analyses the difficult relationship she had with her mother.
Wonderful novel/ autobiography: I hope to read 'Martha Quest', Ms Lessing's autobiography of her youth soon. show less

This is an unusual book in that Lessing is writing a biography of her parents but the first half is her fictional view of how her parents met and had a happy life together. The second portion is the reality of her father losing his leg in the trenches of WW I and of her mother never allowing her children to be free until they fled from her influence.

Her father wished to be an English farmer even though he had no agricultural experience and he and his wife decide to move to Rhodesia after learning of a great opportunity to become rich farming maize there. Of course it was a scam and they never did make enough money to move back to England to purchase the English farm he dreamed of owning.

We do learn a great deal about life in Rhodesia show more between the wars and after leading up to the black rebellion against Ian Smith and the white minority. That portion of volume was gripping. show less

"That war, the Great War, the war that would end all war, squatted over my childhood. The trenches ere as present to me as anything I actually saw around me. And here I still am, trying to get our from under the monstrous legacy, trying to get free.

"If I could meet Alfred Tayler and Emily McVeagh now, as I have written them, as they might have been had the Great War not happened, I hope they would approve the lives I have given them. -- Doris Lessing fromAlfred and Emily

This was a very strange book. Lessing did seem to be trying to exorcise the demons of her childhood. The first half of the book is an alternate reality in which Lessing's parents live the lives they were supposed to--without war and without marrying each other! Alfred show more marries a pretty plump woman, has children and works on an English farm. Emily becomes a nurse, marries a rich surgeon, and uses his fortune to found schools for the poor when he dies suddenly. All this takes place in an England that never went to war (either WWI or WWII.) Because a fairy tale life is boring, Lessing sprinkles in some conflicts with parents, an alcoholic friend, disappointments, etc., but basically they live long and mostly fulfilled lives.

In the second half we get all the tragedy of their real lives, the psychological trauma of loss (Alfred's leg in the war, Emily's great love); the family's trials on an unproductive farm in Rhodesia; Alfred's slow decline and death due to diabetes; Emily's grasping need to live through her children (in the fictional version, Emily has no children!) If anyone wants insight into Lessing's writing, this is a good place to start. She says herself that she spent most of her writing life, working out her problems with her mother. But don't mistake this for historical fiction - it's mostly memoir. show less

This was a rather unsatisfying read. The premise was fascinating - Lessing explains in the Foreword that both her parents' lives were blighted by World War One (her father, a vigorous and active man, because he lost his leg, and her mother because her lover died), and so she wanted to reimagine their lives as if the war had never happened. She does this in the first half of the book. Neither parent is given an uncomplicatedly happy life, but her father at least ends up content, and her mother finds fulfillment (although she desperately longs for children and does not have any). Their stories, though, are very rushed - her mother's ten-year marriage is disposed of in 12 pages, and a later flirtation, which lasts five years, in 4 pages. I show more was also a little disturbed by Lessing's treatment of her mother. She writes, after the first part, that she "enjoyed giving him {her father} someone warm and loving". She also describes her mother's "energy, her humour, her flair, her impetuous way with life", but none of this is visible in the portrait she paints.

The second half of the book is supposedly about her parents' real lives - but in fact much more of it is about Lessing herself - random musings mixed with autobiographical snippets. There is enough information about her parents for the reader to understand how trapped and frustrated her mother must have felt by her life in Rhodesia - working on a failing farm, with none of the high-society colonial living that she had expected, with a husband who was dying by slow and painful degrees. There is not enough information to understand why Lessing's relationship with her mother was so difficult - we are told several times that she hated her mother, but it's not easy to understand why the relationship was so venomous. show less