Iris Murdoch Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Short Stories/Novellas

Publication Order of Plays

Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

Publication Order of Collections

Publication Order of Anthologies

Iris Murdoch is an Irish and British published author. She also went by Dame Jean Iris Murdoch. She was a novelist, philosopher, and lecturer.

Murdoch was born July 15, 1919 in Dublin, Ireland. She was the daughter to Irene Alice and Wills John Hughes Murdoch. Her father came from a family that farmed sheep and worked as a civil servant. He would enlist in 1915 as a soldier, serving in the first World War in France. He would eventually become a second lieutenant. Her mother was from a family in Dublin that was solidly middle class and was a trained singer. Her parents were married in 1918 after meeting in Dublin. She was their only child.

When she was very young they decided to move to London. Her father worked as a clerk for the Ministry of Health. Iris went to progressive independent schools for her education. In 1925 she was in the Froebel Demonstration School and then boarded at Bristol’s Badminton School for six years from 1932-1938. Then she would attend Oxford’s Somerville College. She intended to study English but decided to study the Greats, which focused on a combination of philosophy, ancient history, and classics.

She studied philosophy at Oxford and earned her degree with first-class honors in 1942. Upon leaving she would work for HM Treasury in London. She left in 1944 in June to work for the UNRRA. She would transfer to several locations before leaving in 1946. She would then go to Cambridge to study at Newnham College. She took philosophy as part of her studies as a postgraduate. St. Anne’s College in Oxford made her a fellow in 1948. She would teach courses on philosophy there up until 1963. For the next four years, she would teach the Royal College of Art’s General Studies department for a day a week.

Murdoch would get married in 1956 to John Bayley. He was a novelist, literary critic and a professor of English teaching for a number of years at Oxford University. They met there in 1954. Their partnership would go on for decades until Murdoch passed. Her first novel would also come out in 1954, Under the Net.

Before this she had only had philosophy essays published, as well as a Jean-Paul Sartre monograph. She would turn out to be a prolific writer, composing a total of 26 novels during her time as an author. She would also write and have published works of poetry, criticism, philosophy, and drama.

She was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1976 and was made a Dame Commander in 1987. She also received honorary degrees from places such as the University of Bath, University of Cambridge, Kingston University, and more. In 1982, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences made her a Foreign Honorary Member.

In 1997, she was diagnosed as having Alzheimer’s disease. She would die in Oxford on February 8, 1999. Oxford’s Lady Margaret Hall would later dedicate a bench to her on their grounds. She is recognized globally as a fine award-winning author and noted to be a perfectionist, never allowing her writing to be changed by editors. She was also a playwright.

Her books contended with morality, ethics, good and evil, the unconscious, the role of myth in one’s life, and sexual relationships. Her novel Under the Net would be picked in 1998 by the Modern Library as one of the top hundred best novels of the 20th century. She was also awarded the Booker Prize for The Sea, The Sea in 1978. Thirty years later, The Times put her as twelfth in 2008 for a list of the top fifty greatest British writers since 1945.

She has been associated with several television series and movies. These include The Sandcastle in 1963, part of the ITV Play of the Week. She also wrote the play and novel The Severed Head, adapted to be a movie in 1971. An Unofficial Rose was turned into a television series that aired in 1974 and 1975. Four episodes of The Bell came out as a television series in 1982. There was also Printul Negru, a television movie in 1988 based on a play, Cierny Princ in 1990 as a two part television series, and an episode of Television Theater in 1999.

Under the Net is the first novel to be published of fiction from author Iris Murdoch. This novel features the main character of Jake Donaghue, where readers will get to meet him for the first time.

Jake is an artist, although he’s a bit of a hack writer and a sponger. The novel is set in London, a place where starving artists and rich bookies both live. Jake has not a penny to his name and is looking for somewhere to stay. He’s also looking for Anna Quentin, a girlfriend from the past, as well as her beautiful actress sister.

He meets a philosopher known as Hugo Belfounder. He’s a formidable guy, and the philosopher captures his attention. He meets up with him all the time along with Finn, his companion. Hugo is a profound guy and his reflections are inspiring to Jake.

Together they go on a variety of adventures that have to be read to be believed. These may or may not include kidnapping a dog that is also a film star and a riot on the set of a film made to look like ancient Rome. Jake is entranced by Hugo and wants to know what his secret is. Or is the secret simply Hugo? Jake may channel his fascination and enlightened nature into becoming a writer for real at last. Read this book and take the journey yourself!

The Flight from the Enchanter is the second fictional novel to come out from Iris Murdoch. It was published in 1955.

Annette is at finishing school but decides that she’s going to run away. Once in the real world, she finds that she may be in over her head. At the same time, fierce woman Rosa can’t decide between two brothers, both Polish. A man named Peter cannot rip himself away from an ancient script that he can’t decipher.

They may not even know that they’re caught under a spell. Could Mischa Fox, an enchanter, be behind it all? Check out this creative novel to find out!