Mark Hopwood – författare

Iris Murdoch was a philosopher and novelist of extraordinary breadth and originality whose work defies simple categorisation. Her philosophical writing engages with an astonishingly wide range of figures, from Plato and Kant to Sartre and Heidegger, and her work increasingly inspires debate in ethics, aesthetics, religion, and literature.The Murdochian Mind is an outstanding reference source to the full span of Murdoch's philosophical work, comprising 37 specially commissioned chapters written by an international team of leading scholars. Divided into five clear parts, the volume covers the following areas:A guide to Murdoch's key philosophical texts, including The Sovereignty of Good and Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals. Core themes and concepts in Murdoch's philosophy, such as love, moral vision, and attention.Murdoch's engagement with the history of philosophy, including Plato, Kant, Hegel, Simone Weil, and Wittgenstein. Interdisciplinary connections with art, literature, and religion, including Judaism, Buddhism, and Christianity.Murdoch and contemporary philosophical debates, including feminism, virtue ethics, and metaethics.The application of Murdoch’s thought to applied ethics, including animal ethics, psychiatric ethics, and the environment.Although recent years have seen a blossoming of interest in Murdoch’s philosophy, The Murdochian Mind is the first volume to do justice to the incredibly rich and wide-ranging nature of her work. As such it will be of great interest to students of philosophy, especially ethics and aesthetics, as well as those in related disciplines such as literature, religion, and gender studies.

The moral philosopher and novelist Iris Murdoch said that philosophy “is both the guide and mirror of the age”. In this wide-ranging book Mark Hopwood explores the significance of Murdoch's philosophy in the present day, paying particular attention to her account of the role of metaphor and imagery in moral reasoning. Hopwood argues that one of the main reasons Murdoch's work has often been neglected by mainstream moral philosophers is that she offered a radically different conception of what it means to do moral philosophy. Rather than seeking to establish a single systematic moral framework in the manner of utilitarian or Kantian theories, she argued that moral philosophers ought to be concerned with describing the varied range of moral concepts that we actually use in everyday life and elaborating new concepts and modes of understanding to meet our most pressing social needs.Examining the role of vision, imagination, love, goodness, and transcendence in Murdoch's work, The Moral Philosophy of Iris Murdoch presents a compelling and original argument that she is one of the major moral philosophers of the twentieth century.

Iris Murdoch was a philosopher and novelist of extraordinary breadth and originality whose work defies simple categorisation. Her philosophical writing engages with an astonishingly wide range of figures, from Plato and Kant to Sartre and Heidegger, and her work increasingly inspires debate in ethics, aesthetics, religion, and literature.The Murdochian Mind is an outstanding reference source to the full span of Murdoch's philosophical work, comprising 37 specially commissioned chapters written by an international team of leading scholars. Divided into five clear parts, the volume covers the following areas:A guide to Murdoch's key philosophical texts, including The Sovereignty of Good and Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals. Core themes and concepts in Murdoch's philosophy, such as love, moral vision, and attention.Murdoch's engagement with the history of philosophy, including Plato, Kant, Hegel, Simone Weil, and Wittgenstein. Interdisciplinary connections with art, literature, and religion, including Judaism, Buddhism, and Christianity.Murdoch and contemporary philosophical debates, including feminism, virtue ethics, and metaethics.The application of Murdoch’s thought to applied ethics, including animal ethics, psychiatric ethics, and the environment.Although recent years have seen a blossoming of interest in Murdoch’s philosophy, The Murdochian Mind is the first volume to do justice to the incredibly rich and wide-ranging nature of her work. As such it will be of great interest to students of philosophy, especially ethics and aesthetics, as well as those in related disciplines such as literature, religion, and gender studies.