Degrees of Freedom: The Early Novels of Iris Murdoch

(Paperback)

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Essays on one of the greatest novelists of the twentieth century, Iris Murdoch, by another of the finest writers in modern English literature, A.S.Byatt. This edition includes revealing material not included in the original publication. First published in 1965, A.S. Byatt's Degrees of Freedom examined the first eight novels of Iris Murdoch, identifying freedom as a central theme in all of them, and looking at Murdoch's interest in the relations between art and goodness, master and slave, and the novel of character in the nineteenth century sense. Drawing on Iris Murdoch's own critical and philosphical writing, A.S. Byatt discussed her interest in the thought of Sartre, Plato, Freud and Simone Weil, and related this to the form of the novels themselves. This edition of Degrees of Freedom has an added dossier of later essays and reviews of Iris Murdoch's work by A.S Byatt, taking us up to the publication of The Book and the Brotherhood in 1987. It also includes a substantial pamplet written for the British Council which follows Murdoch's fiction as far as The Good Apprentice.

Reviews

Indispensable fto anyone wanting to understand what it is that Iris Murdoch is up to -- Stephen Wall * The Listener *
An extremely intelligent and penetrating piece of work -- Frank Kermode * Guardian *
Byatt is a wonderful writer, constantly engaging wherever she takes us * The Times *
The great merit of Byatt's writing... is that it continually engages the reader's mind * Daily Telegraph *

Author Bio

A.S. Byatt is a novelist, short-story writer and critic of international renown. Her novels include Possession (winner of the Booker Prize in 1990), and the Frederica Quartet; The Children's Book was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction. She was appointed CBE in 1990 and DBE in 1999 and is the recipient of the Erasmus Prize 2016 for her 'inspiring contribution to life writing'.