The writing of Iris Murdoch has long been of interest to both literature enthusiasts and students of philosophy. The years Murdoch spent studying philosophy at Oxford and Cambridge left an indelible imprint on her work. The essays in this book address both Murdoch’s philosophy and writing in the context of Continental philosophy and postmodern fiction. Many of the twelve essays resist the prevailing critical orthodoxies, introducing instead new theories with which to approach one of Britain’s most revered authors.

M.F. Simone Roberts is an independent scholar with an interdisciplinary doctorate in poetics and feminist philosophy. She is an assistant editor at large for Common Knowledge and has published in a variety of journals. Her study of Luce Irigaray is forthcoming.

Alison Scott-Baumann is a reader emeritus in cultural hermeneutics at the University of Gloucestershire and a member of the Conseil Scientifique at the Fonds Ricoeur in Paris. Her study of Ricoeur was published in 2009.

Edited by M.F. Simone Roberts and Alison Scott-Baumann

Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 278
Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2010
pISBN: 978-0-7864-4026-9
Imprint: McFarland

Introduction: A Cheerful and Encouraging Element in a Confusing Scene
M.F. SIMONE ROBERTS and ALISON SCOTT-BAUMANN      1

1—Two Women in Dark Times
FRANCES WHITE      13
2—A Third Sense of Ethics Between Fiction and Philosophy
AMY SMITH      34
3—Narrative and Symbolic Layering in The Unicorn
JUDIT VARGA      53
4—Morality, Visual Arts, and Rembrandt in Iris Murdoch’s Under the Net and Zadie Smith’s On Beauty
ANNE ROWE      74
5—Enchantment, Transformation, and Rebirth in The Green Knight
SHARON R. WILSON      92
6—Messy Is Flourishing Is Sublime
M.F. SIMONE ROBERTS      107
7—Domination, Resistance, and Anglo-Irish Landlordism in The Servants and the Snow
WEI H. KAO      127
8—Nausea Under the Net
ALISON SCOTT-BAUMANN      147
9—Suffering and Contentment
TONY MILLIGAN      168
10—A Subterranean Dialogue with Nietzsche on the Demonic and Divine in The Sea, the Sea
PETER MATHEWS      190
11—Naturalism and the Good
JOHN HACKER-WRIGHT      203
12—Morality in a World Without God
MILES LEESON      221

Conclusion: A Meditation in Swerves
LUISA MURARO      237
Bibliography      251
About the Contributors      261
Index      263