SOURCE: "Authority, Truthtelling, and Parody: Doris Lessing and 'the Book,'" in Papers on Language and Literature, Vol. 31, No. 3, Summer, 1995, pp. 255-85.

In the following essay, Franko examines "Lessing's ambivalent attitude toward canonical authorities" by focusing on the ways in which the narrators of her novels and short stories—including The Golden Notebook, Briefing for a Descent into Hell, and "The Sun Between Their Feet"—use and view language.

It's O.K. to hate your mom, it's in the book. (Lessing, The Golden Notebook)

What is the function of the story-teller? [Heide Ziegler and Christopher Bigsby, "Doris Lessing," The Radical Imagination and the Literary Tradition: Interviews with English and American Novelists, 1982]

Photographs or sketches of Doris Lessing (her hair pulled back in a no-nonsense bun) adorn the covers of her books and perhaps are intended to support her image as wise woman and stern prophet. Description of Lessing's...