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Iris Murdoch

アイリス・マードック

Airusu Mādokku

Aliases: Dame Jean Iris Murdoch / Dame Iris Murdoch DBE

Profile

Gender
Female
Born
1919-07-15 （Dublin）
Died
1999-02-08 （Oxford） age 79
Nationality
Irish, British
Languages
English
Residence History
Chiswick → Oxford → London

Career

Occupations
novelist, philosopher
Active Years
1954-1995
Affiliations
St Anne's College, Oxford, Royal College of Art
Memberships
Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Influenced By
Plato, Simone Weil, Jean-Paul Sartre, Ludwig Wittgenstein
Influenced
Elizabeth Anscombe, Philippa Foot, John McDowell, Bernard Williams

Education

Somerville College, Oxford
Classics / Greats
Degree: first-class honours
Period: 1938-1942
Year of Graduation: 1942
Country: United Kingdom
studied classics, ancient history, and philosophy
Newnham College, Cambridge
Philosophy
Period: 1947-1948
Year of Graduation: 1948
Country: United Kingdom
postgraduate in philosophy
Badminton School
Period: 1932-1938
Year of Graduation: 1938
Country: United Kingdom
boarding school
Froebel Demonstration School
Period: 1925-1932
Year of Graduation: 1925
Country: United Kingdom
privately educated

Awards

Booker Prize
1978
Work: The Sea, The Sea
Organization: Booker Prize Foundation
Result: winner
Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire
1987
Organization: British Monarchy
Result: awarded
James Tait Black Memorial Prize
1973
Work: The Black Prince
Result: winner
Whitbread Literary Award
1974
Work: The Sacred and Profane Love Machine
Category: Fiction
Result: winner
Shakespeare Prize
1988
Organization: Alfred Toepfer Foundation
Result: awarded
Golden PEN Award
1997
Organization: English PEN
Result: awarded

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

Under the Net

1954 Novel

Her first published novel, selected as one of Modern Library 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century.

good and evilmorality

The Sea, The Sea

1978 Novel

Novel about the power of love and loss, won Booker Prize.

lovejealousyunconscious
Adaptations
  • [Radio drama] The Sea, The Sea (2015)

The Sovereignty of Good

1970 Philosophy

Best-known philosophical work on moral philosophy.

sovereignty of the goodattentionmoral realism

Sartre: Romantic Rationalist

1953 Biography

First monograph on Jean-Paul Sartre in English.

existentialism

Bibliography

  • Under the Net (1954)
  • The Flight from the Enchanter (1956)
  • The Sandcastle (1957)
  • The Bell (1958)
  • A Severed Head (1961)
  • An Unofficial Rose (1962)
  • The Unicorn (1963)
  • The Italian Girl (1964)
  • The Red and the Green (1965)
  • The Time of the Angels (1966)
  • The Nice and the Good (1968)
  • Bruno's Dream (1969)
  • A Fairly Honourable Defeat (1970)
  • An Accidental Man (1971)
  • The Black Prince (1973)
  • The Sacred and Profane Love Machine (1974)
  • A Word Child (1975)
  • Henry and Cato (1976)
  • The Sea, The Sea (1978)
  • Nuns and Soldiers (1980)
  • The Philosopher's Pupil (1983)
  • The Good Apprentice (1985)
  • The Book and the Brotherhood (1987)
  • The Message to the Planet (1989)
  • The Green Knight (1993)
  • Jackson's Dilemma (1995)

Adaptations

  • A Severed Head (film, 1971)
  • The Bell (TV series)
  • An Unofficial Rose (TV series)

Style & Themes

Literary Style
richly layered structurerealistic comic imaginationattention to inner lives
Recurring Motifs
good and evilsexual relationshipsmoral dilemmaspower of the unconsciousenchanter

Health

  • Alzheimer's disease
    1997-1999
    Affected her writing and led to her death.

Legacy

One of the greatest British writers since 1945, known for novels on good/evil, morality; philosopher; Booker Prize winner.

Academic Societies

  • Iris Murdoch Research Centre (University of Chichester)

Archives

  • Iris Murdoch Archive, Kingston University

In Popular Culture

  • Film Iris (2001, Kate Winslet, Judi Dench)

Quotes

  • The sovereignty of good means that good is at the center of reality.
    Source: The Sovereignty of Good (1970)

Trivia

  • Joined Communist Party at Oxford but left in 1942.
  • Born in Ireland but raised in England.
  • Married to John Bayley for 43 years until death.