''The Cleft'' (2007) is a novel by

Doris Lessing Doris May Lessing (; 22 October 1919 – 17 November 2013) was a British-Zimbabwean novelist. She was born to British parents in Iran, where she lived until 1925. Her family then moved to Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), where she remain ...

.''The Daily Telegraph'' 14 January 2007 "Where do little boys come from?" by Claudia Fitzherbert
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Plot summary

The story is narrated by a

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

historian, during the time of the Emperor

Nero Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus ( ; born Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus; 15 December AD 37 – 9 June AD 68), was the fifth Roman emperor and final emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, reigning from AD 54 un ...

. He tells the story as a secret history of humanity's beginnings, as pieced together from scraps of documents and oral histories, passed down through the ages. In the beginning, humanity was composed solely of females who reproduced asexually. They were at peace and had few problems. They lived by the sea and were partially aquatic. They called themselves "Clefts," after The Cleft: a fissure in a rock which the females deemed sacred, and which resembled a

vagina In mammals, the vagina is the elastic, muscular part of the female genital tract. In humans, it extends from the vestibule to the cervix. The outer vaginal opening is normally partly covered by a thin layer of mucosal tissue called the hymen ...

. One day, a Cleft gave birth to a male child, which they called a "monster." They were so frightened that they killed the boy. But more "monsters" were born, and the Clefts left them on a rock to die.

Eagle Eagle is the common name for many large birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of genera, some of which are closely related. Most of the 68 species of eagle are from Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, just ...

s, which lived nearby, saw the dying babies and swooped down and carried them off, to deposit them in a nearby valley where they were then suckled by benevolent deer. The children gradually grew older and able to fend for themselves. Soon, as more boys were brought by the eagles, a tribe emerged. One day, a female wandered over to the valley and was raped by the now-adult men. She fled and gave birth to a new, mixed child nine months later. When she told her story to the rest of the Clefts, the two tribes soon came into contact with each other. The matriarchs of the Clefts, however, feared the "monsters" and decided to try to kill them off.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cleft 2007 British novels Novels by Doris Lessing Fourth Estate books Novels set in ancient Rome