Book description
Hilary Burde, saved by education from a delinquent childhood, cheated
out of Oxford by a tragic love tangle, cherishes his obsessive guilt and
disappointment in a dull, orderly civil service job. When the man whom
he has harmed and betrayed reappears as head of his department, Hilary
hopes for forgiveness, even for redemption and a new life, but finds
himself haunted by a ghostly repetition. Iris Murdoch was a writer and
philosopher. She was born in Dublin in 1919 of Anglo-Irish parents. She
went to school in Bristol, and read classics at Somerville College,
Oxford. She later became a fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford. Awarded
the CBE in 1976, Iris Murdoch was made a DBE in the 1987 New Year's
Honours List. She died in February 1999. Her husband John Bayley has
written a bestselling memoir of his life with her called
Iris
and a major film based on this was released in 2001.
