MOTHER'S DAY SPECIALS! SHOW ME MORE
Iris Murdoch was born in Dublin in 1919 of Anglo-Irish parents. She went to Badminton School, Bristol, and read classics at Somerville College, Oxford. During the war she was an Assistant Principal at the Treasury, and then worked with UNRRA in London, Belgium and Austria. She held a studentship in philosophy at Newnham College, Cambridge, and then in 1948 she returned to Oxford, where she became a Fellow of St Anne's College. Until her death in February 1999, she lived with her husband, the teacher and critic John Bayley, in Oxford. Awarded the CBE in 1976, Iris Murdoch was made a DBE in the 1987 New Year's Honours List. In the 1997 PEN Awards she received the Gold Pen for Distinguished Service to Literature. Iris Murdoch made her writing debut in 1954 with Under the Net, and went on to write twenty-six novels, including the Booker prize-winning The Sea, The Sea (1978). Other literary awards include the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for The Black Prince (1973) and the Whitbread Prize (now the Costa Book Award) for The Sacred and Profane Love Machine (1974). Her works of philosophy include Sartre: Romantic Rationalist, Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals (1992) and Existentialists and Mystics (1997) She wrote several plays including The Italian Girl (with James Saunders) and The Black Prince, adapted from her novels of the same name.
Murdoch is at the height of her powers in this novel, combining a complex plot with a heartrending analysis of the meaning of love * Good Book Guide * The best all-round novel that I've read. It's a brilliant crime novel and a love story that's beautifully written -- Sophie Hannah * Daily Express * A source of wonder and delight...No summary can do justice to the rich intricacy of character and incident with which Miss Murdoch crowds every page * Spectator * This is great Murdoch. It rings as clear as The Bell...her humour is all the more achingly funny because she keeps it on the edge of our vision * Daily Mail * Iris Murdoch's marvellous, heroic novel...A gloriously rich tale * The Times *
