Uniwersytet Warszawski Instytut Anglistyki Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego Anna Grabalska Analiza idei i motywów platońskich w powieściach Iris Murdoch Rozprawa doktorska Praca napisana pod kierunkiem prof. dr hab. Barbary Kowalik Warszawa, 2016 University of Warsaw Institute of English Studies Anna Grabalska An Analysis of Platonic Ideas and Motifs in the Novels of Iris Murdoch A doctoral dissertation written under the supervision of prof. dr hab. Barbara Kowalik Warsaw, 2016 Table of Contents Acknowledgements 3 Introduction 4 I. Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and Iris Murdoch’s Use of Imagery and Space 20 I.1 The interpretation of the Allegory of the Cave in Murdoch’s philosophical essays 20 I.2 The enclosed spaces similar to the Platonic Cave in Murdoch’s Novels 26 I.3 The world of shadows. Murdoch’s depiction of the state of eikasia and Plato’s distrust of sensory data 40 I.4 The Images of the fire and the sun: the characters’ development in the light of the Platonic model 47 I.5 The role of violence in the process of leaving the Cave 58 I.6 The limits of human cognition: the Murdochian balance between discarding illusion and preserving myth 65 I.7 Similarities between Plato’s use of metaphor in The Republic and Murdoch’s writing style employing metaphorical imagery 72 II. Plato’s Dialectic in Iris Murdoch’s Narratives 79 II.1 Socratic dialogue as a genre conducive to education: the relationship between the generic form and content 81 II.2 In search of contemporary sophists: Plato’s dialogues and Murdoch’s characterization 88 II.2.i The figures of writers and artists 90 II.2.ii The characters of psychoanalysts 103 1 II.3 The use of dialectical practice and dialogue in Murdoch’s novels 110 II.4 The pedagogic aspect of Murdoch’s ‘dialectical’ novels 136 III. The Role of Cultural Heritage in Plato’s Dialogues and Iris Murdoch’s Fiction 141 III.1 Poets and rhapsodes as the preservers of cultural heritage and the sources of influence in Plato’s dialogues 141 III.2 The influence of cultural heritage on the characters’ outlook in Murdoch’s novels 150 III.3 Murdoch’s use of intertextuality in the depiction of human consciousness as the echo of Plato’s description of eikasia 162 III.4 From a fictional hero to a real-life moral agent. The link between cultural products and moral choices in Murdoch’s fiction 176 III.5 Depiction of the reader’s experience in Murdoch’s novels 188 Conclusion 204 Bibliography 216 2 Acknowledgements I would like to express my special gratitude to my advisor prof. dr hab. Barbara Kowalik for the continuous support of my doctoral study and related research. Her patience, motivation and all her contributions of time and ideas made my doctoral experience productive and stimulating. Her guidance helped me in all the time of research and writing of this thesis. I could not have imagined having a better advisor and mentor for my doctoral study. My sincere thanks also go to my family for supporting me spiritually throughout writing this thesis. 3 Introduction Iris Murdoch, a world-famous prolific novelist and an increasingly influential moral philosopher, was one of the most intriguing figures in the intellectual landscape of post-war Europe. Her unique oeuvre which combines philosophical inclinations with a passion for literature continues to spur interest in her works and ideas. Acclaimed by literary critics, who have praised her insightfulness and wit, Murdoch managed to mark her presence in the consciousness of her contemporaries and almost two decades after her death she continues to resonate strongly with new generations of readers. Murdoch’s exceptional intellectual constitution displayed in her fiction is grounded in her excellent education. Born in 1919 in Dublin, in her early childhood Murdoch moved with her parents to England where she enjoyed the privilege of attending unusual and prestigious schools, the Froebel Institute and Badminton. She read Classics at Somerville College, Oxford and studied philosophy at Newnham College, Cambridge. Her outstanding academic accomplishments gained Murdoch a Tutorial Fellowship in Philosophy at St Anne’s College, Oxford where she taught for over fifteen years. In 1963-67 she continued her teaching career as lecturer in Philosophy at the Royal College of Art in London. This successful career in academia was complemented by an equally successful writing career. From 1954, the year in which her first novel Under the Net was published, Murdoch continued to develop as an artist. Awarded the Booker Prize, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the Golden PEN Award, she spent most of her life publishing her writing and actively participating in discussions concerning ethical and moral issues. After a dramatic battle with Alzheimer’s disease, Murdoch died in 1999 leaving a colossal oeuvre of twenty- six novels, two poetry collections, several plays, one short story and some substantial pieces of work on continental philosophy from Plato to Kant and from Hegel to Sartre.1 During her life Murdoch showed interest in ideas originating in various disciplines ranging from Ancient philosophy, Christian theology and Buddhism, to nineteenth-century canonical writers like Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, George Eliot and Proust, the political thought of 1 Murdoch wrote a first monograph about Jean-Paul Sartre published in English, Sartre: Romantic Rationalist (1953). She also wrote a book of moral philosophy The Sovereignty of Good (1970) which comprises her three previously published papers: “The Idea of Perfection”, “On ‘God’ and ‘Good’” and “The Sovereignty of Good over Other Concepts”. The papers contain Murdoch’s response to the views of Plato, Simone Weil, Stuart Hampshire, Kant, Freud and Marx. Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals (1992) is Murdoch’s another piece of work on philosophy. The book is a revised and expanded version of Murdoch’s 1982 Gifford Lectures and elaborates among others on Plato, Kant, Hegel, Buddhist philosophers, Schopenhauer and Derrida. 4 Marx, and Freud’s psychoanalysis. The list of conceptual sources providing Murdoch with material for reflection is thus extensive and encompasses ideas that were formulated in Ancient Greece as well as the most compelling and exciting theories originating in the twentieth century. The years she spent at university provided Murdoch with an opportunity to make lasting friendships and she was acquainted with the leading figures of the contemporary philosophical scene. The bonds between Murdoch and Philippa Foot, Mary Midgley and Elizabeth Anscombe were formed during her first years at Oxford. Among the moralists, logicians and language-analysts who left an indelible impression on her one should also mention the names of Gilbert Ryle, Richard Mervyn Hare, Stuart Hampshire, Alfred Jules Ayer and Charles Stevenson. The list of people whose presence is markedly indicated in Murdoch’s intellectual life would not be properly assembled if the name of Ludwig Wittgenstein were not included. From 1947-48 Murdoch held the Sarah Smithson studentship in philosophy at Newham College, Cambridge. Although she was not formally taught by Wittgenstein, she met him at that time and remained deeply influenced by his philosophy throughout her career. Apart from the crème de la crème of the Oxbridge post-war graduates and distinguished professors, Murdoch also made significant acquaintances outside the university walls. During her stay in Brussels, where she went on behalf of UNRRA to work in camps for refugees,2 she became familiar with existentialism. In 1945 she met in person the main figure of the movement, Jean-Paul Sartre. The importance of this meeting is evidenced by her first published book, which was on Sartre and was the first monograph in English to present Sartre’s philosophy to a British audience. The Bulgarian-born novelist and playwright Elias Canetti also played an important role in Murdoch’s life. This Nobel Prize Laureate was a powerful source of influence who held Murdoch in his intellectual grip for almost three years from the time they met in 1952. Another important source of inspiration for Murdoch was Simone Weil, the French philosopher, Christian mystic and activist. In her book Iris Murdoch, Gender and Philosophy, Sabina Lovibond points out: “Beginning in the early 1950s, Iris Murdoch falls under the 2 UNRRA stands for United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. It was an international relief agency founded in 1943 in order to help the victims of war in the areas under the control of the United Nations. 5 influence of the French religious thinker Simone Weil (1909-43) and accepts from her certain ideas that will leave an indelible mark” (28). After years of probing and analysing various concepts, Murdoch found philosophical thought which turned out to be resistant to the trial of time. Miles Leeson, following Peter Conradi, observes: “Platonism was the only philosophy which remained with Murdoch throughout her life, and which she never disowned or discarded […] Platonism is never far from the surface of almost every novel discussed, it is in the competition with other, more contemporary philosophies” (2). Murdoch’s choosing to develop a form of Platonism in the later twentieth century was to say the least unusual considering the prevalence of analytic and language philosophy in post-war Britain. David Tracy observes that “for many philosophers in the Continental tradition from Nietzsche through Heidegger to Deleuze, Plato is where the Greeks took a wrong turn – either away from the honest aesthetic world of tragedy