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Arts & Ideas

Iris Murdoch's The Sovereignty of Good

Feb 5, 2024
Bidisha, Peter Conradi, and Lucy Bolton discuss Iris Murdoch's 'The Sovereignty of Good,' exploring her views on good/evil, unconscious, sex/love, and her impact on philosophy. They delve into Murdoch's interpretations of goodness, characters, relationships, and her influence on moral lives, highlighting her unique approach to morality and philosophical insights.
44:49

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Quick takeaways

  • Iris Murdoch emphasizes the importance of attention, reflection, and unselfing to achieve moral growth.
  • Murdoch's novels explore themes of identity, love, and the search for meaning, showcasing morally complex characters.

Deep dives

The Philosophy of Iris Murdoch

Iris Murdoch's work explores the ideas of goodness and moral philosophy. She believes that ethical questions should be lived rather than explored on paper. She emphasizes the importance of attention, reflection, and unselfing to achieve moral growth. In her book 'The Sovereignty of Good,' Murdoch argues that we can attain nearness to goodness by piercing the veil of selfishness through the process of unselfing. She draws inspiration from Plato and Freud, seeing the journey towards goodness as akin to a purification of desires. Murdoch's characters in her novels are morally and intellectually experimental, exploring concepts such as religion, sexual politics, and the search for personal meaning. Her fiction serves as a space to test her philosophical positions and proposals. Overall, Murdoch's work encourages us to strive towards goodness and to refine our own moral vision.

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