I like Murdoch, so I probably liked this one. I can't remember much about this book, after all the years since I read it. ( )

Have I mentioned that I love Iris Murdoch? I love this book, its like a practice run for The Sea The Sea, with a dreadful and deluded male narrator, convinced of his own genius and importance, but constantly thwarted by the interruptions of others. As ever the complex interactions of the cast unfold with both horrible and hilarious consequences, the final postscripts giving a somewhat different version of events. ( )

Es curioso, pero lo que más me ha interesado de este libro es el despliegue de técnica. Ya sé que es algo superficial, pero Murdoch utiliza una amplia variedad de técnicas narrativas que va combinando sabiamente para mantener el interés del lector. En general, alterna los rápidos diálogos con las parrafadas reflexivas de una forma que me recuerda a la ópera, donde los números líricos (arias, dúos, etc), en los que lo importante es la música, se alternan con los números más activos (por ejemplo, recitativos), que hacen avanzar la acción. Además, abundan los golpes de efecto, las apariciones de personajes (en persona, por teléfono, por carta) en los momentos más inoportunos y, por supuesto, los giros de guión. Esto último hasta el final. La novela incluye dos prólogos y seis epílogos, además del prólogo de verdad (quiero decir, ajeno a la novela), y en estos últimos los diferentes personajes dan su versión de los hechos, que no se corresponde necesariamente con la que cuenta el protagonista y que constituye el cuerpo de la narración. En realidad, todo sucede a través de apenas ocho personajes, que aparecen, desaparecen y se entrecruzan mientras el lector cambia de opinión sobre ellos varias veces a lo largo del texto.

Además de ser muy efectista (algo que, por lo visto, le reprochan sus detractores), la novela plantea algunos temas "grandes" sin pasar por alto la variedad de sus matices: el amor en distintas circunstancias (en particular, entre dos personas de edad muy dispar), la verdad, la imagen propia y la que nos adjudican los demás, el papel de los escritores e intelectuales en general y quizá algún otro. Hay humor y situaciones cómicas o al menos grotescas, pero también hay pasión, desilusión, envidia, celos, reflexión y, al final, hay muerte.

Al principio pesé: "Pero ¿de qué demonios va esto?", y poco a poco me ha ido atrapando. ( )

Bradley Pearson es un escritor mayor que sufre un bloqueo creativo. Rodeado de una telaraña de variopintos y curiosos personajes, Pearson intenta buscar una salida desesperada a su angustiosa situación, al tiempo que se ponen de manifiesto las más absurdas complejidades de las relaciones sentimentales.

Protagonist and narrator Bradley Pearson, a fifty-eight-year-old retired tax accountant, intends to retreat from society to write his masterpiece. He is about to leave town when he receives a series of phone calls. We meet Bradley’s ex-wife, Christian, brother-in-law, Francis, and sister, Priscilla. We meet fellow author, Arnold, his wife, Rachel, and their twenty-year-old daughter, Julian. Bradley is called to intervene in a domestic violence episode between Arnold and Rachel. After a brief dalliance with Rachel, he believes he has found the ultimate in true love with Julian. Bradley writes about a critical period in his life. He presents his version of events, then four of the main characters offer postscripts to provide their viewpoints.

The reader will need to pay close attention to the details of the story in order to figure out what to believe. Bradley admits that he lies to the other main players. He makes excuses. He does not accept responsibility for his actions. He often behaves atrociously. He seems deluded in many ways. He says he has learned something through his ordeal, and we want to believe him. But he also seems reprehensible and hypocritical in his actions.

We spend lots of time in Bradley’s thoughts, and these thoughts meander into ponderous inner dialogues about life, love, art, marriage, morality, self-deception, jealousy, and suffering. The characters are well developed. It contains elements of both comedy and tragedy.

The story is written in such a way that spurs the reader’s curiosity. I came up with a satisfactory interpretation and I think part of the fun of reading this novel is analyzing it at the end. Published in 1973, this is the second novel I have read by Iris Murdoch. I very much enjoy her writing style and plan to read more of her works.

Memorable passages:

“People who model their experiences on works that they admire are all too likely to be egocentric lovers, seeking to cast the beloved into a scenario dreamed up inside their own fantasy.”

“We are always representing people to ourselves in self-serving ways…that gratify our egos and serve our own ends. To see truly is not the entirety of virtue, but it is a very crucial part.”

“If one is prepared to publish a work one must let it speak for itself.”

“She [Julian] had filled me with a previously unimaginable power which I knew that I would and could use in my art. The deep causes of the universe, the stars, the distant galaxies, the ultimate particles of matter, had fashioned these two things, my love and my art, as aspects of what was ultimately one and the same. They were, I knew, from the same source. It was under the same orders and recognizing the same authority that I now stood, a man renewed.”

“Art is not cosy and it is not mocked. Art tells the only truth that ultimately matters. It is the light by which human things can be mended. And after art there is, let me assure you all, nothing.”
( )