Lessing says 9/11 'not that bad'

Doris Lessing has been nominated for the Booker Prize three times

Nobel Prize-winning author Doris Lessing has said that the 11 September attacks were not as significant as the terror campaign waged by the IRA.

She acknowledged the events in the US on that day in 2001 were "terrible".

But she told Spanish newspaper El Pais: "Some Americans will think I'm crazy... but it was neither as terrible or as extraordinary as they think."

The 88-year-old added that "people forget" the IRA bomb attack on Margaret Thatcher's government in 1984.

"September 11 was terrible, but if one goes back over the history of the IRA, what happened to the Americans wasn't that terrible," she said.

"Many people died, two prominent buildings fell, but it was neither as terrible nor as extraordinary as they think."

Everyone is tired of this man. Either he is stupid or he is very clever Doris Lessing on President George W Bush

She described Americans as "a very naive people, or they pretend to be".

"Do you know what people forget? That the IRA attacked with bombs against our government.

"It killed several people while a Conservative congress was being held and in which the prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, was [attending]. People forget," she said.

Five people died and 34 were injured when an IRA bomb exploded in a hotel in Brighton where leading members of the Conservative Party - including Mrs Thatcher - were staying for their annual conference.

'World calamity'

Lessing won the Nobel Prize, worth £763,000, honouring her 57-year career.

She was recognised for her "fire and visionary power", and is due to collect her award at a ceremony in Stockholm on 10 December.

The writer, whose novels include The Golden Notebook and Memoirs of a Survivor, also branded US President George W Bush "a world calamity".

"Everyone is tired of this man. Either he is stupid or he is very clever, although you have to remember he is a member of a social class which has profited from wars."

The writer also said that she "always hated Tony Blair from the beginning".