The Children of Violence is a sequence of five semi-autobiographical novels by BritishNobel Prize in Literature-winnerDoris Lessing:Martha Quest (1952),A Proper Marriage (1954),A Ripple from the Storm (1958),Landlocked (1965), andThe Four-Gated City (1969).[1] The novels "are strongly influenced by Lessing's rejection of a domestic family role and her involvement withcommunism."[2] Lessing identified the series as abildungsroman.[3]
The series follows the life of protagonist Martha Quest from adolescence until her death, which takes place in the future, in the year 1997. The first four novels are set during the 1930s and 1940s, in the fictional country ofZambesia, based on the formerBritish colony ofSouthern Rhodesia (nowZimbabwe), where Lessing lived from 1925 until 1949.[4] The fifth work,The Four-Gated City, is set inLondon, primarily in the 1950s and 1960s. The novel's appendix extends into adystopian future in which Britain has become uninhabitable due to an unspecified catastrophe, speculated to be either anuclear detonation or mass contamination fromchemical weapons following a fire atPorton Down.[3]
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