The Characters In Alice Murdoch's Novels And The Writer's Moral Philosophy

Iris Murdoch(1919-1999)is one of the most important writers in Britain since World War II,she is not only a novelist but also a philosopher.Murdoch is a prolific writer and known as the most intelligent female writer since George Eliot(1819-1880).Her works cover novel,poetry,drama and philosophy are all closely around the question about how to get the way back to the essence of man during the age of god's death.Murdoch's thought is a system of moral philosophy aiming at approaching the conception of "good",it guides people to break illusion and fantasy and see the world of contingency,it tells people that the real "good" exists only when you shift your attention to others and realize the differences.Murdoch replaces the position of "God" with"good " and makes "good" a metaphysical transcendental position.As the postmodernism trend popularized in western societies,the literary world was filled up with broken postmodern characters,Murdoch proposed her own literature point:creating a house for freeman,and put forward the viewpoint that creating the image of figures that was real.However,Murdoch is conflicted,and her creation is not that consistent with the theory of creation,which was obviously reflected in her attitude towards her characters.First of all,the characters in Murdoch's novels live in a metaphysical world,far from the real world,and trapped in parochial interpersonal relationship,driven by instinctive lust,again and again lost in moral dilemmas.Murdoch widely adopted the "outsider" plot pattern and apply the concept of "Eros",attempting to break the fence and give the egoists chance to find the truth through the conflict.Secondly,Murdoch often has the figures to express her own view,that makes her novels didactic.In order to not make novels her own preaching,she takes some narrative strategy in shaping characters into comic figures lacking consistency,unreliable narrators,so that the readers can communicate with the characters and the writer effectively.When the novel becomes an open text,characters in it could be free.Finally,there are always similar images in Murdoch's novels,the most representative examples are the categories of "artist" and "saint",which are mainly conceptual characters.These two types of people embody concentrated reflection of Murdoch's moral ideal,and evolving as Murdoch's thought changes,developing new possibilities through the dynamic appearances.Murdoch tries to depict the real moral situation of modern people through her novels,characters in her novels wandering about but banging their heads against wall everywhere.We can see her contradictions and struggles,and see her perseverance and persistence for decades in exploring a way out in moral despair.