This is my first Iris Murdoch. First I finished, at any rate. It takes place (and was written) half a century ago and the things people worried about seem kind of ancient. Perhaps the things people worry about now will seem that way in 50 more years. The people were very real and I wanted to pull them out of time into the present and tell them they needn't worry so much about those things. Mother Claire, the aquatic Nun seemed to be relatively untroubled. Maybe it was the middle state, halfway between religious and secular, that caused the characters so much trouble. Toby seemed to work it out by becoming secular. Michael came to some sort of relative peace--better than he started out. Dora, at least, left Paul, but I wonder if she's going to be OK.

There's something tragic about a world where, with few exceptions, the faithful are so quick to condemn and the worst crime is love (though the Abbess says the opposite and I agree.)