Iris Murdoch

Despite huge advances in the treatment of women these past few decades, I still believe that in general female writers are underappreciated, especially female philosophers. One writer whom I believe does not get enough credit for her extensive and prolific writings is Iris Murdoch.

A novelist and a university lecturer who taught philososphy at Oxford, Murdoch was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1919. The daughter of an English father and an Irish mother, she grew up in England and studied the classics, ancient history and philosophy.

I find her life as fascinating as a novel. She met men like Jean-Paul Sartre, the famous existentialist writer. She had an affair with Elias Canetti, a novelist/essayist who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1981. Eventually she married John Bayley, who later became a professor of English at Oxford, and despite her inablity to remain monogamous, the couple remained married until her death. In forty years she wrote twenty-six novels, plus a wealth of plays and philosophical and critical studies. Unfortunately she was struck by Alzheimer's disease in her later years and died in 1999 with very little of the mental capabilities that had defined her life.

Murdoch was well-educated, something that is quite apparent in her writings. I find that her background seeps through every word, which makes her writing doubly interesting to me. I have read two books of hers, The Book and the Brotherhood and The Philosopher's Pupil.

The first made me curious, since I love books that have a book as a theme and the mention of a brotherhood added to the appeal. One of the main characters has the assignment to write "the book of books," the book that will encompass all philosophical elements and theories and will be so good that it will influence the rest of the world. He is financed by a group of friends called "the brotherhood."

Despite my initial reaction to the title, I quickly found that Murdoch's use of the term "brotherhood" was ironic. Instead of the suggested solidarity between the people in the brotherhood, the relationships are much more complicated and the reader finds that all the characters have inner psychological relationships with each other that they do not show on the outside. Further, all have a special emotion regarding the one chosen to write the book, David Crimond. As the story progresses, the characters act in sometimes flabbergasting ways that one would never imagine. Murdoch takes her time describing the characters, revealing both inner and outer traits and making the book even more psychological than philosophical. Throughout the book she discloses some secrets that make you wonder if the people around you and the people you meet are like her characters. What are they hiding?

Much of the same motif applies to The Philosopher's Pupil. Again there are a great many characters who all have inner psychological relationships that do not show on the outside. People are in love with one and another without showing it, while enduring marriages to people that they hate. A key character is an old philosopher named John Robert Rozanov, a man to whom everybody is attracted. True to Murdoch's form, all of the characters have his or her share of secrets that are not to be disclosed.

It is said that Iris Murdoch dealt with everyday ethical or moral issues and I think that characterization is more applicable to The Philosopher's Pupil than to The Book and the Brotherhood. Personally, I thoroughly enjoyed these two books. They are thick and extensive--not books you read in one sitting--and maybe that part of what makes them good. Murdoch's detailed descriptions of characters and their intricacies are what makes a lasting impression. After reading her books, you may find that you don't look at people with the same eyes again. You may find yourself constantly wondering what the people around you are hiding under their exterior shells.