Long, long Murdoch

Press, 29 July 1989, Page 22

Long, long Murdoch

The Book of the Brotherhood. By Iris Murdoch. Penguin, 1989. 601 pp. $14.99 (paperback) (Reviewed by Joan Curry) A group of people, friends from their days at Oxford, commission the political activist David Crimond to write a book reflecting the worldreforming ideas of the group. They agree to contribute to Crimond’s support while he writes the book and to leave him alone while he gets on with it. Years later they are still paying, still waiting for the book, but now disturbed at the possible contents. “I don’t see why we should keep paying out money every year to support a book that we passionately disagree with, which we aren’t allowed to look at, which he may have abandoned ages ago, which perhaps never existed at all!” wails one of Crimond’s patrons. The members of the group have, presumably, changed with the times, with maturity. They seem to have made compromises with life, and have moved away from the positions they held so idealistically during their Oxford days. Crimond has isolated himself, and as far as anyone can tell he is still set on the course he embarked on as an

undergraduate. He has also made himself rather disagreeable to most of his one-time friends, but can exert a powerful influence on them when he chooses. He is arrogant and singleminded, awkward and unpredictable, and he lurks in and out of v the shadows of the lives of his friends. He pinches one of their wives, but the aggrieved husband goes on paying his share of Crimond’s support — presumably only because he is a gentleman and he must stick by the agreement he made all those years ago. The “book committee” argue interminably about their dilemma, but do practically nothing to resolve it. The average reader is bound to ask: why on earth do they bother with Crimond at all? And the next question springs to mind only too often: why am I reading about these dreary people at such length and with so little reward? Everybody is rather dull, often longwinded and given to interior monologues. The book goes on and on and on, and only duty, and a certain respect for the august name of Iris Murdoch, forced me to keep picking up the book after putting it down. In fact it has taken me many weeks to finish it.