Because I am a sucker for Doris Lessing, I will even read a 1987 account of the war in Afghanistan, meant to be an urgent plea for aid to the mujahidin, valiantly fighting invading Soviets without equipment or food. To say the least, a lot has changed in 28 years and this short read should have felt like a complete waste of time. But Doris Lessing wrote it, so it was thoughtful and prescient and I learned all sorts of things that other writers couldn't have put together in 1,000 pages.
Lessing's writing has such a fearless quality. I suspect she always wrote exactly what she thought, without regard for who might be offended. Her impressions of the situation of Afghan women refugees in Pakistan are, as a result, far more nuanced than anything else I've read. I don't always agree with her, and I think in person I might even have disliked her, but I am never sorry to have read what she puts on the page.
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