1% Well-Read: The Grass is Singing

Simply take my advice on this one: Doris Lessing is not the best reading choice during the early, heady days of a world-wide economic crisis. The Grass is Singing was a wonderful read, but the story of a couple sinking into financial, emotional, physical and spiritual ruin amidst bleak poverty does not provide much in the way of a welcome distraction.

I'm not sure if there is anything else that can be written about The Grass is Singing that has not already been committed to paper (or the screen, in this case). Lessing's prose is sparse without feeling empty; in this work the language echoed the promise of a hidden richness found in the landscape, but was as inaccessible to the reader as the land was to either Mary or Dick Turner. Mary was at turns pitiable and exasperating, and wholly unlovable. Come to think of it, I have a hard time remembering even one amiable named character in the entire book. I think my favorites may have been the women who came to the Turners' store with their children, but then left when it became clear how unwelcome they were as individuals and a group.

And Moses ... well, I cannot feel that Moses is a fully realised character. Who is he? What drives him to his final acts? What would the story look like from his viewpoint? What a fascinating novel that would be, much like Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea. The analogy between Moses and Rhodesia seem obvious, but I cannot love the story more for it. That neither the country nor Moses can sustain the Turners is clear, but Moses is his own person, not the land that slowly kills the hopes and abilities of Mary and Dick.

Despite my distaste for the characters, however, I cannot fault the story or the book. What a gift it is, complete and compelling on its own. The technical precision of the storytelling makes the story that much more inexorable and heartbreaking.

I have not chosen my next read for the 1% Well-Read Challenge. I'm trying to finish Sharon Kay Penman's Devil's Brood, which is long, written in a small font, and printed on light paper. It's also as obsessive a read as her earlier works. Speaking of obsessions, I finished the Twilight series, and it was enjoyable. Not perfect, sometimes irritating, but a fun and light story (mostly). Perhaps I can say that Doris made me read it ;o)