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Doris Lessing gets Nobel Prize in Literature

It's great to win the Nobel prize before shuffling off this mortal coil than post-humus...

Charlie (she looks great at 88) Monoxide
 
Is she the first science fiction and fantasy author to win it?

Rudyard Kipling, Hermann Hesse, and William Golding all wrote some SF, but it's only the odd story out. Gabriel García Márquez possibly comes closest to being a real writer of fantastic fiction among the laureates before Lessing, I'd say.

I must admit I had a hard time struggling through "Shikasta" at age 14, newly awakened to the (with hindsight) considerably less complex joys of Asimov and Heinlein :D
Martha Quest still on the to-do list...
 
She is a great example of an award winning author whom I find unreadable. I've tried. Perhaps it's the lack of a sense of humor. Or the extreme pretentiousness.

Which certainly doesn't disqualify her for awards. If you follow the awards (say, the Man Booker prizes), you can only figure that the judges, at least, have great senses of humor.

Only my opinion. Doesn't count for anything except what I will buy or borrow. No sir.

ETA: I can't see her as an SF author. She may borrow forms and themes, but that is different.
 
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