Doris Lessing (1919 – 2013)

We are saddened by the news that Nobel Laureate Doris Lessing passed away, yesterday, at the age of 94.  During a glittering career – which spanned over half a century and garnered her many awards culminating, of course, in the 2007 Nobel Prize for Literature – Doris Lessing produced more than two dozen novels as well as numerous collections of short fiction, poetry, memoirs and other non-fiction. She will be best-known to most SF fans for her Canopus in Argos: Archives series, comprising  Shikasta (1979), The Marriages Between Zones Three, Four and Five (1980), The Sirian Experiments (1980), The Making of the Representative for Planet 8 (1982) and The Sentimental Agents in the Volyen Empire (1983).

But more than just writing a science fiction series, Doris Lessing proudly and unambiguously declared them to be science fiction, and for that she will for ever hold a place of affection in our hearts.

Doris May Lessing (1919 – 2013). Rest in peace.