The Cleft: A Novel

Doris Lessing

Unfortunately for me this happened to be my first taste of Lessing's work. Unfortunate because it wasn't as engaging as I hoped it would be with it's unique take on the subject of the creation of the human and the origin of sexuality and gender.

What I found particularly annoying was the fact that the narrator, a historian in Nero's Rome, found it extremely necessary to punctuate his compilation of the history/myth, whatever one prefers to call it, of the Cleft with anecdotes of his own personal experiences regarding gender, sexuality and the various biases associated with it. It is not that it was a bad idea. It is just that at times it made the text seem suffocatingly cluttered.

This apart the book comprised two distinct portions with an uncomfortable, seemingly abrupt time leap in between: The birth and persecution of the first 'male' by the human-like (aquatic?) creatures, followed by the first ever sexual experience and the birth of the first human, and of course the stiff resistance and persecution of these 'New Ones' and their parents at the hands of the Clefts. The second portion deals with their lives- their ways, their development, their hopes and fears pertaining to their survival as a species.

The second portion seemed exceeding tiresome due to the constant repetition of certain facts and the persistent emphasis on certain behavior that were highlighted as being gender typical- as for example, men never ask for directions and will never consider possible consequences or that women will always nag and worry. There is not one individual, with the exception of Maire, and that too barely, who acted different from her incurious and complacent to the level of lazy kin and discovered the 'males' living on the other side of the 'Killing Rock', who is apart from the neatly outlined gender stereotype. In fact, everyone seems extremely content to live within these boundaries, and their leaders, Horsa and Maronna, are the epitome of these types, leading by example almost, and are therefore particularly tedious in that context. Horsa and his men would be reckless: looking for challenges and adventure irrespective of how dangerous or stupid, and Maronna and the women would live in constant fear of their safety and in wait for their return, while caring for the younger ones, and trying to remain calm despite their panic at their 'bellies being empty' i.e., not being pregnant and therefore not contributing to the growth of the species.

Also, there is the fact that the genders are themselves also resigned to the gender role of the other- for the men, women exist as nurturer in their early years and later, required only to relieve libido, and for the women, men existed only as being necessary for pregnancy and therefore procreation, without which their darkest fear of extinction would be realised.

What is interesting, however, is how certain episodes stand out from their context due to the manner of their description, how they exist on their own, whole and independent. Certain phrases, and the feelings, thoughts, fears and doubts that they convey with chilling accuracy that grabs the reader's attention, even if for a moment, and cause in them a sympathetic reaction.

I guess the book is fine as a different approach on the subject it is on, if one is prepared to skip a bunch of tiresome and irrelevant pages in between.