Iris Murdoch
Iris Murdoch
Dame Jean Iris Murdoch DBEwas an Irish novelist and philosopher, best known for her novels about good and evil, sexual relationships, morality, and the power of the unconscious. Her first published novel, Under the Net, was selected in 1998 as one of Modern Library's 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. In 1987, she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire. Her books include The Bell, A Severed Head, The Red and the Green,...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth15 July 1919
CountryIreland
Iris Murdoch quotes about
A middling talent makes for a more serene life.
Human affairs are not serious, but they have to be taken seriously.
There is a gulf fixed between those who can sleep and those who cannot. It is one of the greatest divisions of the human race.
One of the secrets of a happy life is continuous small treats, and if some of these can be inexpensive and quickly procured so much the better.
What a test that is: more than devotion, admiration, passion. If you long and long for someone’s company you love them.
We defend ourselves with descriptions and tame the world by generalizing.
I feel half faded away like some figure in the background of an old picture.
We re all muddlers. The thing is to see is when one's got to stop muddling.
Socrates wrote nothing. Christ wrote nothing.
The very madness of the scheme protects it.
There is nothing like early promiscuous sex for dispelling life's bright mysterious expectations.
Not to have been born is undoubtedly best, but sound sleep is second best.
It's easier to sell junk when you're known than works of genius when you're unknown.
I hate solitude, but I'm afraid of intimacy. The substance of my life is a private conversation with myself which to turn into a dialogue would be equivalent to self-destruction. The company which I need is the company which a pub or a cafe will provide. I have never wanted a communion of souls. It's already hard enough to tell the truth to oneself.