1,162 Quotes by Iris Murdoch

I saw through a black veil of misery and remorse and indecision and fear; and there was a feeling as if I carried a small leaden coffin in the place of my heart.

I wanted to drag us all down into some common pool of feeling, I wanted to stop this conventional machine of awful insincere politeness.

Good-bye to the past, with its mysteries which would never be fully unfolded.

She must not be tempted by truthfulness, she must play the game out to the end.

In this connection I must mention too a not altogether rational idea which I had nourished more or less vaguely for a long time: the notion that before I could achieve greatness as a writer I would have to pass through some ordeal. For this ordeal I had waited in vain. Even total war (I was never in uniform) failed to ruffle my life. I seemed doomed to quietness.

Ducane knew that Willy had looked forward to this visit. He knew too that the visit was rendering Willy unspeakably miserable.

In my experience a good row not only does not clear the air but can land you with a lifelong enemy.

I just hope — if he does come — it won't be some sort of horror show.

On this diet of expectation, he had fairly frenzied himself by the time he arrived.