Great Writers 4: IRIS MURDOCH

[stewartvcm]

And having watched the other writers videos, I also heard several DH Lawrence readings as well! Thet seem to agree with her, have you ever considered Sri Lanka as a new starting post to save the world? Interestingly there has also been a lot of RL Stevenson as well, would you rank him as a good or great writer?

[stewartvcm]

I'm in Sri Lanka doing some speech exams and it was amazing to her a piece of Murdoch used as an own-choice text. I have never seen it selected anywhere in the UK so it was refreshing to hear it after seeing your video. I feel she is so underated and is another great writer who has been simply hidden away because she didn't fit in!

[OldGrumpyGuy]

@stewartvcm It's nice to know that appreciation of Iris Murdoch has spread to Sri Lanka. And you are right. She is underrated. But more importanty I think, she is not as widely acclaimed as she should be

[Wolfsonian]

Murdoch was not a Professor (at least, not in the British sense). She was simply a Fellow of St Anne's, if memory serves. She was a jolly good philosopher, though.

[workismoney1]

have you ever thought of doing book reviews?

[OldGrumpyGuy]

@workismoney1 I just don't have the time!

[JakeDonaghue]

Thanks for your video. You could be a really good teacher... ;)

[OldGrumpyGuy]

Thanks Jake. I don't think I would be a good teacher, however. I'm too impatient

[JanoSeishu420]

Really like your Great writers videos. Hope you plan on making more of those in the future:)

[OldGrumpyGuy]

Tack (thanks in Swedish for readers who don't know). I have plans for more but right now I am working on my stage musicals and have little time for anything else..

[lagirasole]

I've seen the film so many times, but it makes me cry everytime I watch it.

[Enraged5150Juiced]

Forget gay marriage lets stop the gays or the people who appear to be gay from spreading it. people like this guy should not be allowed to make videos the encourage gayiteeee

[OldGrumpyGuy]

You are obviously a deeply repressed homosexual, Enraged. You will feel better when you come out of the closet.

[andy1234566]

have you done any video on borges? and if not: why??

[jakeisdead]

you mind taking an apprentice neh?

[xensboy]

I met Iris Murdoch and John Bailey in Santiago de Compostela in around 1999. She was highly intelligent, though a speech she gave was rather muddled.

Though I haven't read much of her work, I have a feeling that by always writing about personal relations she limited the scope of her legacy.

She was very nice and I did like both her and Mr Bayley, an outstanding literary critic.

[kofothree]

Read, "The Bell." It's fun!

[bridgebum826]

Your video has done more to spark my interest in the writings of Iris Murdoch than that movie starring Kate Winslet, Judi Dench and Jim Broadbent.

[OldGrumpyGuy]

nice to know. Thanks.

[33388665599]

E.T.A. Hoffman wrote about Robotic sex dolls in 1816! Now theres a guy who can write.

[AchillesEightyThree]

Hey, Grumpy. I recently read The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by 19th century author Robert Louis Stevenson. The thing that most captured my attention was the extensive vocabulary he employs, even in a novella written for a young audience. Even Dean Koontz, whose orante descriptions surpass those of most modern contemoraries, uses a lesser variety of words in his work. Dr Jekyll: "... I risked the experiment while under the empire of generous or pious aspirations." Hardly Harry Potter.

[AchillesEightyThree]

It's a shame that television and other electronic forms of entertainment have replaced, by large, our love for -- and command of -- the English language. I doubt many children would be able to slog through the first page of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde before being lured away by their Playstation 3 and the temptation of blasting aliens with automatic weaponry.

[OldGrumpyGuy]

There's a very thin line between a rich use of vocabulary and over-flowery language. I'm not exactly sure where that example falls. At the other extreme you have Hemingway and his followers whose writing I find very dry. I think Murdoch and Koontz strike a good balance.

[AchillesEightyThree]

Yes, you're absolutely right. Authors should demonstrate careful judgement when composing prose, and, although some writers claim they only write for themselves, I think commercial authors have an obligation to at least consider the perferences of their target audience. Just because a writer knows a really clever five-syllable synonym for "happy", doesn't mean he should use it, especially if it's going to give readers a headache. lol

[QHJFRD]

There's a difference between style and substance in writing. The audience should never be forgotten in terms to style; it should never be consulted for substance.

[Baskerville22]

"There is only one freedom of any importance, whatsoever: the freedom of the mind" - b quote from Iris.

This is an outstandingly stupid statement. It implies that the being chained in a Soviet Gulag or Chinese 're-education' camp is nothing - only a loss of a physical freedom.

If one cannot enjoy individual liberty, then "freedom of the mind" is a meaningless concept. Only a self-deluded artist could talk such dangerous nonsense.

[OldGrumpyGuy]

One could argue that preserving individual freedom of the mind is the only way you can survive a gulag.

[Baskerville22]

A spurious "free" mind is hardly proof against a club, starvation rations, slave labour and arbitrary brutality.

You could make a case that a strong, disciplined mind might increase your chances of surviving an extended regime of physical and mental abuse, but to say that "freedom of the mind is the ONLY freedom of importance" is to encourage, if not surrender to, the barbararians.

[OldGrumpyGuy]

I think you are being silly. Goodbye

[33388665599]

that and wet dreams

[blueshadowdude]

Grumpy, you've once more showed me that I am shockingly unread. I've looked at only one of Murdoch's works: "The Sea, the Sea," which I did not finish, finding it rather jumbled and too melodramatic for my taste. But perhaps I will give her a second chance. Thanks for the video. Very informative.

[OldGrumpyGuy]

"The Sea The Sea" was one of her novels I did not like as much as most of her others. It took about a hundred pages before it started to take off.

[blueshadowdude]

Ahhh, that might explain it. I picked it up because it won the Man Booker Prize.

[OldGrumpyGuy]

I think that might have been the beginning of Alzheimers. Her last book, which was written when she was in the advancing stages of it, was very confused and disjointed and was hailed by critics and academics as one of her greatest. Which just goes to show.

[earthatic]

I love her books! Very interesting video, thanks for posting!

[BassfooIer]

Thanks for sharing your wisdom .