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The Cleft: A Novel
by Lessing, Doris
- Used
- very good
- Hardcover
- first
- Condition
- Very Good/Very Good
- ISBN 10
- 0060834862
- ISBN 13
- 9780060834869
- Seller
-
Olympia, Washington, United States
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
Harper, 2007-07-31. First Edition. Hardcover. Very Good/Very Good. 96x16x136. Hardcover. Stated first edition with full number line. Light shelf wear to boards and dust jacket. Minor scuffing to dust jacket. Binding square and tight. No highlighting, notation, or remainder marks. Thank you for supporting Last Word Books and independent bookstores.
Synopsis
Doris Lessing, one of England's finest living novelists, invites us to imagine a mythical society free from sexual intrigue, free from jealousy, free from petty rivalries: a society free from men.An old Roman senator, contemplative at his late stage of life, embarks on what will likely be his last endeavour: the retelling of the story of human creation. He recounts the history of the Clefts, an ancient community of women living in an Edenic, coastal wilderness, confined within the valley of an overshadowing mountain. The Clefts have no need, or knowledge, of men – childbirth is controlled, like the tides that lap around their feet, through the cycles of the moon, and their children are always female. But with the unheralded birth of a strange, new child – a boy – the harmony of their community is suddenly thrown into jeopardy. At first, in their ignorance, the Clefts are awestruck by this seemingly malformed child, but as more and more of these threateningly unfamiliar males appear, now unfavourably nicknamed Squirts, they are rejected, and are exposed on the nearby mountainside; sacrificed to the patrolling eagles overhead, the sentinels of their female haven. Unbeknownst to the Clefts, however, these baby males survive, aided by the very eagles sent to kill them, and thrive on their own on the other side of the mountain. It is not until an unusually curious young Cleft named Maire goes beyond the geographical, and emotional, divide of the mountain that this disquieting fact is uncovered – a discovery that forces the Clefts to accept and realign themselves to the prospect of a now shared world, and the possible vengeance of the wronged males. In this fascinating and beguiling novel, Lessing confronts head-on the themes that inspired much of her early writing: how men and women, two similar and yet thoroughly distinct creatures, manage to live side by side in the world, and how the specifics of gender affect every aspect of our existence.
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Details
- Bookseller
- Last Word Books
(US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- SKU1003219
- Title
- The Cleft: A Novel
- Author
- Lessing, Doris
- Format/Binding
- Hardcover
- Book Condition
- Used - Very Good
- Jacket Condition
- Very Good
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Edition
- First Edition
- ISBN 10
- 0060834862
- ISBN 13
- 9780060834869
- Publisher
- Harper
- Place of Publication
- New York
- Date Published
- 2007-07-31
- Size
- 96x16x136
- Keywords
- fiction
- X weight
- 15 oz
Terms of Sale
Last Word Books
30 day return guarantee, with full refund including shipping costs for up to 30 days after delivery if an item arrives misdescribed or damaged.
About the Seller
Last Word Books
Biblio member since 2010
Olympia, Washington
About Last Word Books
Books are a gateway drug. It starts out innocently enough, reading C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, pretty soon you are reading harder stuff like Kerouac and Burroughs, the next thing you know you're strung out on Bukowski and DeSade, worrying about the Patriot Act and Free Speech, and joining the ACLU. If books are your drug of choice, Last Word has your fix!
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Shelf Wear
- Shelf wear (shelfwear) describes damage caused over time to a book by placing and removing a book from a shelf. This damage is...
- Jacket
- Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
- First Edition
- In book collecting, the first edition is the earliest published form of a book. A book may have more than one first edition in...
- Number Line
- A series of numbers appearing on the copyright page of a book, where the lowest number generally indicates the printing of that...
- Tight
- Used to mean that the binding of a book has not been overly loosened by frequent use.
- Remainder
- Book(s) which are sold at a very deep discount to alleviate publisher overstock. Often, though not always, they have a remainder...
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