Why Did Iris Murdoch Turn to Love: An Exploration of Key Factors

Abstract

This thesis stems from Iris Murdoch’s claim that love should be central to moral philosophy. Specifically, in Murdoch’s thought, love is elemental to an ideal of perfection. The aim is to offer an understanding of certain aspects of Murdoch’s thought which underpin her articulation of an ethic of love, and, if Murdoch’s view as developed here is convincing, to suggest how particular ways of being in the world exemplify the enabling conditions required to reveal the pervasive presence of love. For Murdoch, our response to the world is embedded in love, and while love seeks the Good, attachment to ego can distort our capacity to become morally better. Crucially, here, it is not that love is degraded in Murdoch’s view, it is that our receptiveness to love and thus reality is obscured by our egocentrism. This general observation has special significance in relation to the impetus of this thesis. That is, Murdoch turns to the power of love in its capacity to direct us away from self and bring us to the Good. In acknowledging the omnipresence of love, it is my view that Murdoch sought to explore how the attitudes and ways of being related to moral understanding bring us into relation with love. In this context love is understood as a form of energy that inspires a moderation of selfish concern in order to perceive reality or, the Good. Focussing on five key factors that play an important role in Murdoch’s thought, this work suggests that each of these exemplify a particular way of being that inspires a stretching outward away from self and, in so doing, have the capacity to reveal rightly directed love. The factors drawn from Murdoch’s work are inner life, unselfing, particularity, religion and beauty. I argue that Murdoch is weaving a narrative about a way of being that is exemplified in all five of the factors explored in this thesis. My intention is to demonstrate that Murdoch encourages epistemic ways of being in the world that have the capacity to reveal love’s energy and enable the apprehension of moral reality. In accepting this picture of Murdoch’s work as plausible I suggest here an answer to the question of why Murdoch turns to love, then, can be shown by way of her understanding of the wider conceptual notions through which we approach the world. The exploration of Murdoch’s thought in relation to these five factors is conducted through close readings of her work as well as engagement with the secondary literature.

Date of Award	3 Mar 2026
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Winchester
Supervisor	Thomas Norgaard (Supervisor), Neil Messer (Supervisor), Nora Kreft (Supervisor) & Timothy Secret (Supervisor)