martha quest by doris lessing

Martha Quest
by Doris Lessing

**********************

about the book

Intelligent, sensitive, and fiercely passionate, Martha Quest is a young woman living on a farm in Africa, feeling her way through the torments of adolescence and early womanhood. She is a romantic idealistic in revolt against the puritan snobbery of her parents, trying to live to the full with every nerve, emotion, and instinct laid bare to experience. For her, this is a time of solitary reading daydreams, dancing -- and the first disturbing encounters with sex. The first of Doris Lessing's timeless Children of Violence novels, Martha Quest is an endearing masterpiece

//////////////////////////////////////////////

discussion questions

1. Martha Quest examines the conflicts that occur between mothers and daughters. What kinds of issues do Martha and her mother differ on? To what extent are these differences generational, and to what extent are they personal?

2. Compare the scenes that take place in nature, on the farm and veldt, with those set in town. How does Lessing's writing-its language, its focus, its rhythms-change from one setting to the next? What does this reveal about Martha-and about Lessing herself?

3. Looking at a gathering of people on the steps of the Socrates' veranda, Martha remembers "with shame the brash and easy way she had said to Joss that she repudiated race prejudice; for the fact was, she could not remember a time when she had not thought of people in terms of groups, nations, or color of skin first, and as people afterwards." (p. 67) Does this way of thinking make Martha a racist?

4. Compare Martha's relationships with the men she meets in town with those she knows from the farm. How and why is Martha different with both sets of men?

5. What do you think of her reactions to sex, and of the way she felt and acted after she and Adolph first made love?

6. What kind of marriage do Mr. and Mrs. Quest have, and what kind of model does it give Martha for her own future relationships?

7. When Martha declares that she will not be like the wives of the Left Book Club do you believe her? What does the Club reveal about men and women's roles, even in a "liberal" society?

8. What does the Sports Club represent in Martha's life, and what does it represent in the town?

9. How do Martha's experiences compare with your own adolescence and young adulthood. Has Lessing accurately captured teenaged life?

10. Is Martha's story political or personal? How is she a product of her place and time, and of its social and sexual mores?

11. Martha Quest was written nearly half a century ago. How do you think the novel has aged?

In Martha Quest, people seemed locked in roles which cause them to act in ways that have nothing to do with their real feelings or their real selves. At the beginning of the novel she is on a farm in South Africa with her parents. There is a brother, little mentioned, because he was sent away to a good school though she is a reader and he is not. She is in a battle with her mother who tries to control her life, and also has all the typical English attitudes about native Africans. Her father simply wants to avoid conflict. Her only real relationships are with the two sons of a Jewish shop keeper, who is fairly isolated in the area because of his Jewishness. They lend Martha books and her association with them seems to be what allowed her to form opinions about the equality of people that are different from those of all the others around her. Her opinions are intellectual, however, and don't prevent her from feeling prejudice, and, in this book, she does not act on her ideals.

What she does do is to finally break away from her parents, at the age of 17 or 18, helped to do so by Josh who arranges a job interview with his uncle, and moves to town and a job as a secretary. In the middle of discovering she is not really qualified as a secretary, and beginning to take classes to improve, she becomes part of a crowd that spends a lot of time at the sports club. Again there is the disjoint between who she really is, and the roles she plays in this group. In a short period of time, she drifts into three or four different relationship with people whom she doesn't really like. At the end of it at age 18 she is getting married. A few days before her fiance has asked if she really wants to go through with it, and she feels a sense that there is no stopping it, she knows she will get married. At the same time, a small voice inside her is telling her that she will not stay married.

The point of view of the novel. It is third person, and, but though it stays in Martha's head, it seems to be of someone reflecting back on Martha rather than in the moment. Sometimes you see the current Martha and this other person's thoughts side by side, with the other person commenting on Matha's actions Martha, herself, has an inner voice, the real Martha, so in a sense there are three voices: Martha in her role; the real Martha; the future (also real) Martha - I'm guessing on the last

mohamed said sherif

$

mohamed ibrahim sherif

thnk you

» martha quest by doris lessing
» doris lessing