Have you always thought you could do with some expert guidance when reading Iris’s philosophy? Well help is at hand! This episode marks the start of a new mini-series of episodes where we’ll be reading Iris’s collected essay collection – Existentialists and Mystics – with a team of excellent academics and seasoned readers, and you can join us for the experience! Each episode will focus on a small number of essays – or perhaps just one essay if it is substantial in length – and explore exactly what Murdoch was up to and how the essay fits in with her overall vision. We’ll keep in roughly chronological order, starting with her work from the 1950s and ending up in the mid-1980s with her two Platonic dialogues. Although Existentialists and Mystics doesn’t contain all of her published philosophy it’s a great place to start so, if you’ve not got a copy, you can pick one up very reasonably second-hand via this link:
https://www.bookfinder.com/search/?isbn=9780140264920&st=xl&ac=qr
In this episode we’re starting out with her earliest material on Existentialism – closely reading ‘The Existentialist Hero’ and ‘The Novelist as Metaphysician’ as well as her review of Simone de Beauvoir’s The Ethics of Ambiguity – all from 1950. The two essays were originally given as talks on BBC Radio’s The Third Programme; and are the groundwork for her first monograph, Sartre: Romantic Rationalist that would be published just a few years later in 1953.
Joining Miles is Sam Filby, currently working on his PhD thesis on Murdoch at Northwestern University, Chicago; and the current recipient of the BSH research fund. His work focuses on Murdoch’s aesthetics and moral psychology
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51:29
Iris Murdoch's Wild Imagination Podcast
Miles is joined by Lucy Oulton (University of Chichester) to discuss her new book, Iris Murdoch's Wild Imagination: Nature and the Environment (Palgrave, 2025).
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-87833-6
This book presents the first ecocritical study of novelist, philosopher, poet and public intellectual Iris Murdoch (1919–1999). It brings her love of the natural world into the light, arguing for its critical significance when Murdoch conveys an awareness of intricately interconnected ecologies through her work: an awareness that anticipates the motivations and concerns of modern-day environmental humanities. The book is the first of its kind to assess some of Murdoch's poems, seen as early articulation of the environmental imagination that finds recurrent expression in her novels, philosophical writings and personal journals throughout her writing life. This book offers a significant entry point for a new research direction in Murdoch studies by explicating her unique perspective on the natural world.
Lucy Oulton is a Research Associate at the Iris Murdoch Research Centre, University of Chichester, UK. She is an Editor of the Iris Murdoch Review, to which she has also contributed.
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58:42
The Moral Philosophy of Iris Murdoch Podcast
In this episode Miles is joined by joined by Mark Hopwood, Associate Professor of Philosophy, from the University of Sewanee, USA to discuss his new book – which has just been published – The Moral Philosophy of Iris Murdoch. This is his first monograph since he published the co-edited volume that he’s perhaps best known for in Murdoch circles, the magisterial Murdochian Mind in 2022. Both books published by Routledge.
https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/The-Moral-Philosophy-of-Iris-Murdoch-by-Mark-Hopwood/9780367819576
Examining the role of vision, imagination, love, goodness, and transcendence in Murdoch's work, The Moral Philosophy of Iris Murdoch presents a compelling and original argument that she is one of the major moral philosophers of the twentieth century.
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1:12:07
Lecture 'A Warm Bright Significant Space' Iris Murdoch's Search for Home
In this, her first public lecture, Dr Maria Peacock discusses Iris Murdoch's search for home using examples from her novels and biography.
This lecture was given at the University of Chichester on Saturday 29th March, 2025.
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41:00
Iris Murdoch Individuals and Ethics Podcast
In this episode Miles is joined by Prof. Bridget Clarke (University of Montana) to discuss her new book, entitled ‘Iris Murdoch’ in the Cambridge Elements, Elements on Women in the History of Philosophy series from Cambridge University Press.
https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/Iris-Murdoch-by-Bridget-Clarke/9781009358149
Bridget is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Montana and her research interests include the History of Ethics, Moral Psychology and, of course, Iris Murdoch, who she has been working on for the past twenty years or more. This new book, however, is her first monograph dedicated solely to Murdoch work.
To access Iris Murdoch's Review of Dr Zhivago - mentioned at the end of the podcast - use this link:
https://mailadminchiac-my.sharepoint.com/:w:/g/personal/m_leeson_chi_ac_uk/ESChvUwQ5xpIiacFzothi7QB8eT3VRQavDZRT83RCUuvVg?e=FEEhQe
The Iris Murdoch Society exists to promote her work, further her philosophical vision, and enhance and extend knowledge. You can find our website here: https://irismurdochsociety.org.uk/
You can find us on Twitter - https://twitter.com/IrisMurdoch
On Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/2213699051
And at Chichester University: https://www.chi.ac.uk/humanities/public-humanities/literary-and-cultural-narrative/iris-murdoch-research-centre/iris-murdoch-society
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