The Bell Introduction by A. S. Byatt
The Bell
Dame Iris Murdoch (1919-1999) was one of the most
acclaimed British writers of the twentieth century. Very prolific,
she wrote twenty-six novels, four books of philosophy, five plays,
a volume of poetry, a libretto, and numerous essays before
developing Alzheimer's disease in the mid-1990s. Her novels have
won many prizes: the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for The
Black Prince, the Whitbread Literary Award for Fiction for The
Sacred and Profane Love Machine, and the Booker Prize for The
Sea, The Sea. She herself was also the recipient of many esteemed
awards: Dame of the Order of the British Empire, the Royal Society
of Literature's Companion of Literature award, and the National
Arts Club's (New York) Medal of Honor for Literature. In 2008, she
was named one of the Times' (London) 50 greatest British writers
since 1945.
A. S. Byatt, novelist, short-story writer, and critic, is
the author of many books, including Possession, winner of the Man
Booker Prize.
Priase for Iris Murdoch and The Bell:
"Murdoch was the rare kind of great, buoyant, confident writer who
could drive the whole machine. She was as in touch with animal
instincts as intellectual ones. The scope of her vision makes you
feel, when you are close to her fiction, that you have glimpsed the
sublime." —Dwight Garner, The New York Times
"Funny, sad, and moving . . . The Bell is a novel about people who
have ideas, people who think, people whose thoughts change their
lives just as much as their impulses or their feelings do." —A. S.
Byatt
"Like the best of Murdoch's novels, The Bell is about love and
freedom, the interplay between the two and the destructive force of
love-gone-wrong . . . her dialogues exist on a bright, self-aware
plane . . . she's writing about the only things that matter—love,
goodness, and how to be happy without hurting others." —The
Independent
"In my late teens, A Severed Head and The
Bell opened my eyes to another world. I took them as a
rather elegant form of social realism, and I loved the new world
they opened up to me." —Mary Beard, Times Literary
Supplement
"Wonderfully lively and poignant at the same time, tender with a
sprightly social commentary." —The Guardian
"A new level of sophistication for Murdoch . . . effortless
shifting between the grim and the humorous." —Richard
Nicholls, The New York Times
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