Doris Lessing
"Ideally, what should be said to every child, repeatedly, throughout his or her school life is something like this: 'You are in the process of being indoctrinated. We have not yet evolved a system of education that is not a system of indoctrination. We are sorry, but it is the best we can do. What you are being taught here is an amalgam of current prejudice and the choices of this particular culture. The slightest look at history will show how impermanent these must be. You are being taught by people who have been able to accommodate themselves to a regime of thought laid down by their predecessors. It is a self-perpetuating system. Those of you who are more robust and individual than others will be encouraged to leave and find ways of educating yourself — educating your own judgements. Those that stay must remember, always, and all the time, that they are being moulded and patterned to fit into the narrow and particular needs of this particular society."
43 Quotes
"Ideally, what should be said to every child, repeatedly, throughout his or her school life is something like this: 'You are in the process of being indoctrinated. We have not yet evolved a system of education that is not a system of indoctrination. We are sorry, but it is the best we can do. What you are being taught here is an amalgam of current prejudice and the choices of this particular culture. The slightest look at history will show how impermanent these must be. You are being taught by people who have been able to accommodate themselves to a regime of thought laid down by their predecessors. It is a self-perpetuating system. Those of you who are more robust and individual than others will be encouraged to leave and find ways of educating yourself — educating your own judgements. Those that stay must remember, always, and all the time, that they are being moulded and patterned to fit into the narrow and particular needs of this particular society."
"تخيلوا لو قيل لكل طفل، مراراً وتكراراً، طوال حياته المدرسية، ما يشبه هذا: "إنكم في طور التلقين. لم نطور بعد نظاماً تعليمياً لا يكون نظام تلقين. نعتذر، لكن هذا أقصى ما يمكننا فعله. ما تتعلمونه هنا هو مزيج من التحيزات الراهنة وخيارات هذه الثقافة بعينها. وأدنى نظرة إلى التاريخ ستُظهر مدى زوال هذه الأمور. يعلمكم أناس استطاعوا التكيف مع نظام فكري وضعه أسلافهم. إنه نظام يديم نفسه. أما من هم منكم أكثر قوة وتفرداً من غيرهم، فسيُشجَّعون على المغادرة وإيجاد سبل لتعليم أنفسهم – لتعليم أحكامهم الخاصة. وأما من يبقى، فعليه أن يتذكر، دائماً وفي كل حين، أنه يُصاغ ويُشكَّل ليتناسب مع الاحتياجات الضيقة والخاصة لهذا المجتمع بعينه."
Doris Lessing
The Golden Notebook
"There's an unconscious bias in our society: girls are wonderful; boys are terrible. And to be a boy, or young man, growing up, having to listen to all this, it must be painful."
"هناك تحيز لا واعٍ في مجتمعنا: الفتيات رائعات؛ والفتيان فظيعون. ولا بد أن يكون مؤلماً للفتى، أو الشاب، وهو يكبر، أن يضطر للاستماع إلى كل هذا."
Doris Lessing
"For the last third of life there remains only work. It alone is always stimulating, rejuvenating, exciting and satisfying."
"في الثلث الأخير من العمر، لا يبقى سوى العمل. فهو وحده ما يظل دائمًا محفزًا، مجددًا للروح، باعثًا على الحماس، ومبعثًا للرضا."
Doris Lessing
"When you're young you think that you're going to sail into a lovely lake of quietude and peace. This is profoundly untrue."
"عندما تكون شابًا، تظن أنك ستبحر إلى بحيرة ساحرة من السكينة والطمأنينة. هذا أبعد ما يكون عن الحقيقة."
Doris Lessing
"Humanity's legacy of stories and storytelling is the most precious we have. All wisdom is in our stories and songs. A story is how we construct our experiences. At the very simplest, it can be: 'He/she was born, lived, died.' Probably that is the template of our stories - a beginning, middle, and end. This structure is in our minds."
"تراث البشرية من القصص والحكايات هو أثمن ما نملك. كل الحكمة تكمن في قصصنا وأغانينا. القصة هي الكيفية التي نبني بها تجاربنا. في أبسط صورها، يمكن أن تكون: "وُلد، عاش، مات." ربما هذا هو القالب الأساسي لقصصنا – بداية، ووسط، ونهاية. هذا الهيكل متأصل في عقولنا."
Doris Lessing
"What really fascinates me is this need that is so strong now that if you read a work of the imagination you instantly have to say, 'Oh, what this really is is so-and-so,' reducing it to a simple formula."
"ما يأسرني حقًا هو هذه الضرورة الملحة التي بات"
Doris Lessing
"I do not think that marriage is one of my talents. I've been much happier unmarried than married."
"لا أظن الزواج من مواهبي. لقد وجدت سعادتي أعظم بكثير في العزوبية منها في الزواج."
Doris Lessing
"I think kids ought to travel. I think it's very good to carry kids around. It's good for them. Of course it's tough on the parents."
"أرى أن الأطفال ينبغي لهم أن يسافروا. أعتقد أن حمل الأطفال والتنقل بهم أمر بالغ الأهمية ومفيد لهم. بالطبع، هو شاق على الوالدين."
Doris Lessing
"Man, who is he? Too bad, to be the work of God: Too good for the work of chance!"
"الإنسان، ما هو؟ خسارة أن يكون صنعة الإله: أسمى من أن يكون محض صدفة!"
Doris Lessing
"September 11 was terrible but, if one goes back over the history of the IRA, what happened to the Americans wasn't that terrible."
"كانت أحداث الحادي عشر من سبتمبر مروعة، لكن إذا"
Doris Lessing
"The great secret that all old people share is that you really haven't changed in seventy or eighty years. Your body changes, but you don't change at all. And that, of course, causes great confusion."
Doris Lessing
"I see every book as a problem that you have to solve. That is what dictates the form you use. It's not that you say, 'I want to write a science fiction book.' You start from the other end, and what you have to say dictates the form of it."
Doris Lessing
"What society doesn't realize is that in the past, ordinary people respected learning. They respected books, and they don't now, or not very much. That whole respect for serious literature and learning has disappeared."
Doris Lessing
"Women are the cowards they are because they have been semi-slaves for so long. The number of women prepared to stand up for what they really think feel experience with a man they are in love with is still very small."
Doris Lessing
"That's what learning is. You suddenly understand something you understood all your life but in a new way."
Doris Lessing
"Growing up is after all only the understanding that one's unique and incredible experience is what everyone shares."
Doris Lessing
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