Androgyny or Catastrophe

been nourished by Sufism, a form of Islamic mysticism, which she admires. Unlike Lessing's earlier fiction which was simply influenced by ideas of Sufism, three of her novels, Briefing for a Descent into Hell (1971), Summer Before Dark (1973), and Memoirs of a Survivor (1974), are literally Sufi fables-that is, symbolic stories, each of which illuminates truth. 1 Sufi truth illuminated by these novels is that is One, and that because we have long ignored that truth, we now have an urgent choice make between oneness and catastrophe. In these novels Lessing insists that unless we consciously and actively choose that personal and recognition of our inherent oneness with others and with nature, which I term we shall destroy all, or almost all, of life on this planet. Lessing uses word wholeness or rather than androgyny, but I believe more contemporary and revolutionary term will more fully enable us realize her meaning. Androgyny was symbolized in ancient Greece by hermaphroditic god/ goddesses who had double power of male/ female and therefore full power of original androgynous deity. As Ernest Becker states in his book Denial of Death, The hermaphroditic image represents a striving for wholeness, a striving that is not sexual but ontological. It is desire... for.., unity with rest of nature, as well as for a completeness in oneself. It is a desire for a healing of ruptures of existence, dualism of self and body, self and other, self and world.2 Because Sufism concerns itself with this same ontological striving for wholeness,3 its art similarly creates images depicting the human soul in search of, and in progress toward, final harmony and integration with all creation.4 Theosophic Sufis tell us that we must get back in touch with divinity-that is, potential androgyneity or or full power-in each of us. duty of theosophist or Sufi (such as Lessing) is to keep alive in human being his or her spiritual intuitions,5 for human beings, through intuiting their own wholeness, will in turn intuit their Oneness with one another and with Nature.6 As an ardent student of Sufism who has expressed in her nonliterary writing her admiration for ideas of a modern day Sufi leader, Idries Shah,7 Lessing follows Sufi tradition of subtly teaching Sufi ideas through literature. Thus, without being polemical and without mentioning Sufism per se, Lessing writes stories convey her urgent message.8 Like other Sufis, Lessing feels she has special sensitivities that enable her see not only importance of androgyny (personal, social, and cosmic unity), but also inability of other people share her insight. This general insensitivity is related, she thinks, fact that Western patriarchal societies have discouraged development of several powers, labeled and denigrated

Androgyny · Art · Art history · Doris (gastropod · Masculinity · Psychoanalysis · American Jewish Fiction Analysis · Literature, Magical Realism, García Márquez · Psychology · Themes in Literature Analysis