What do you know about promiscuity?! Iris Murdoch certainly has something to tell you. Crazy passion, homosexuality, incest and all the variations of adultery - about all this and not only you read in the book "Severed Head".
It was just the case that with a gnashing of teeth, overcoming sleep and boredom, after finishing the first 150 pages (out of 300), I suddenly exclaimed: "Oop-op-op-op-op!!!" The first half of the book was pretty depressing, but then how it all turned around. So if you're suddenly going to read it, be prepared to walk steadfastly to the end, and it will not disappoint you. And definitely throughout the novel you won't let go of the question: will someone's head really get chopped off or is it just a cruel joke of the author, symbolizing the exploded brain of the reader? And whose head is depicted on the cover - a male or a female? (I had a book by the publishing house "Makhaon", where on the cover there was a smirking face of an indeterminate gender riding on a samurai sword)
Irish-born British writer, university lecturer and prolific and highly professional novelist, Iris Murdoch dealt with everyday ethical or moral issues, sometimes in the light of myths. As a writer, she was a perfectionist who did not allow editors to change her text. Murdoch produced 26 novels in 40 years, the last written while she was suffering from Alzheimer disease.
The plot is almost textbook: the happy hero has a wife and a mistress and is in no hurry to change things and reveal the secret of his advantageous position, while his wife informs him that she is leaving him for her lover. Our hero did not know the saying: hurry to leave your partner first, before you yourself are left. And the fact that it hurts to know you are cheated, even when you yourself cheat every day.
Worse than that: the lover is the best friend of the protagonist, and besides that, and psychoanalyst! And here is another folk wisdom: do not mess with psychoanalysts - they will clean your brain, and his wife, and generally drive you crazy. Well, then the situation gradually brought to the absurd, love quadrangular grows into a pentagonal, then the hexagon, and the main character begins to diagnose himself the most insane mental illness and is already jealous of the serene life of his secretary lesbians.
I actually love reading family novels about relationships between men and women, but I didn't like the author's whole game of psychoanalysis. The narration is narrated from the male protagonist, who talks about all his worries and doubts, about why he made this particular choice and why it is important for him to have a mistress while having a perfect marriage with his wife. On the one hand, it looks interesting that a female author managed to get into a man's head and describe his feelings quite plausibly, on the other hand, I don't think the average man even bothers that much.
A separate point is the dialogues of the characters. Now that's just scary. After all, the heroes love to solve all the problems through conversations, analyze everything and, at the instigation of the psychoanalyst, try to "be reasonable and behave in a civilized manner" - this is their motto. All their behavior because of this seems terribly illogical and inadequately positive. The wife and her lover do not want to let the unhappy husband go and try in every way to help him and control his life. The apotheosis of the absurdity comes when they find out about his mistress and begin to organize their further happiness together. This is where the most protracted and tedious dialogue awaits you. Relax - the rest will be more fun!
In general, I think this whole book is a kind of satirical play, which would be ideal to play on the stage. Just look at the list of characters:
Martin Lynch-Gibbon, entrepreneur
Antonia, his wife.
Georgie, his mistress.
Alexander, his brother.
Rosemary, his sister.
Palmer Anderson, his friend, a psychoanalyst (I read the name wrong the first time)
Honoria, Anderson's half-sister, daughter of his stepfather Immanuel Klein (and this Honoria is the greatest bringer of misfortune, the Evil Genius, the Dark Goddess. And, by the way, the accent in the name seems to be on the second syllable.)
The characters become entangled in their own lies and get caught up in their own suspicions, alternately switching partners with each other and playing out something between a detective and a comedy. Fear not, I haven't spoiled the entire book, and you may still be caught off guard by three or even four unexpected plot twists.
As I was reading, I didn't think I would want to recommend this book to anyone. Its style and plot would not appeal to everyone at all. But now I've read the book and I'm dying to talk to someone about all the characters: who behaved the most decently? Whose emotions and behavior seemed more believable? Who did you feel most sorry for and who was the opposite? And so on. So if anything in it interests you, read it, and I'll be happy to discuss it with you.
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