Iris Murdoch and Love course 2024
Iris Murdoch and Love
Live online course
Thursdays, 7 March to 2 May 2024, 6.00 to 8.00 pm British Time
SOLD OUT
‘Love is the extremely difficult realisation that something other than oneself is real. Love, and so art and morals, is the discovery of reality.’ - Iris Murdoch
Love, in its many forms, is the main theme of all of Iris Murdoch’s novels. She explores the complexities of love alongside desire, trauma, grief, loss, and joy and their effects, both tragic and comic.
We will begin by looking at a selection of non-fictional and biographical works to explore Murdoch’s thoughts on love, and then we will study the set four novels with these thoughts in mind. The lectures aim to to build up a picture of an author whose entire life revolved around love and its aftereffects.
Live online course: five lectures and seminars, Thursdays, fortnightly, 7 March to 2 May 2024, 6.00 to 8.00 pm.
Our lecturer is Miles Leeson, Director of the Iris Murdoch Centre, University of Chichester
Lecture list
Lecture 1. Essays on love in Existentialists and Mystics. 7 March 2024
Lecture 2. The Sandcastle (1957). 21 March 2024
Lecture 3. A Fairly Honourable Defeat (1970). 4 April 2024
Lecture 4. The Sea, The Sea (1978). 18 April 2024
Lecture 5. The Philosopher's Pupil (1983). 2 May 2024
Set texts
Iris Murdoch, The Sandcastle (1957)
Iris Murdoch, A Fairly Honourable Defeat (1970)
Iris Murdoch, The Sea, The Sea (1978)
Iris Murdoch, The Philosopher's Pupil (1983)
Iris Murdoch, selected essays from Existentialists and Mystics (1999)
Optional further reading
John Bayley, The Iris Trilogy: Memoirs of Iris Murdoch (2020)
Links
Iris Murdoch Research Centre, University of Chichester
Peter Conradi, obituary of Iris Murdoch, Guardian, 9 February 1999.
Sarah Churchwell on The Sea, The Sea, Guardian, 2 April 2016.
Course fees
£250 full price for 5 sessions (includes 20% VAT)
£225 students and CAMcard holders (includes 20% VAT)
Zoom link
We will send you a Zoom link by email approximately 24 hours before the course begins. If the link does not arrive, please let us know by email in good time, at least an hour before the session begins, so we can re-send.
Recordings
This is a 5-session course, with a live online lecture and seminar each fortnight. The lectures are recorded so that participants can listen again during the course if they wish. The seminars are not recorded.
If you cannot attend a course you have booked
Please note that, because places are limited, we cannot give refunds if you cannot attend a course. But if you contact us in advance, we might be able to transfer your booking to a different course.
Comment from the first Iris Murdoch course:
‘Dr. Leeson is a wonderful speaker on Murdoch, and has an amazingly expansive knowledge of her oeuvre. His lectures opened up a new world of resources to dive into. It was really a treat to attend these fortnightly lectures, and to spend time with other people who wanted to explore Murdoch's novels. I can't wait to pick up where we left off with the Gothic series.’ – Beth, Brighton, UK