Iris Murdoch discovery leads to new poetry collection 

A new book of poetry by Iris Murdoch is being released next month, after two Chichester academics discovered a chest filled with notebooks of hand-written poems in the writer’s attic. 

Dr Miles Leeson, Reader in English Literature and Director of the Iris Murdoch Research Centre at the University of Chichester, and Professor Anne Rowe, Visiting Professor at the University, were invited to help clear the attic at the late writer’s Oxford home in 2016. There, they came across an old oak chest filled with her work, including around 600 poems. 

These works have now been edited and published for the first time, with the book release on November 6th and a launch party at the University on November 8th, with more events to follow across the UK. 

Miles said: “We discovered ten notebooks of poetry, composed in Murdoch’s distinctive hand and containing hundreds of poems, many revised repeatedly over decades. 

“Iris spent years recrafting her poems over and over. Such perfectionism meant that transcribing her poetry notebooks took a group of dedicated volunteers almost five years. The same poem would appear in multiple versions, sometimes written years apart, which brought distinct challenges in deciding which one most accurately represented the emotional intensity of the poem. These dilemmas were exacerbated by the increasing illegibility of Murdoch’s handwriting which, clearly legible in her youth, became more erratic.” 

In the introduction by writer Sarah Hall, she describes the moment of discovery: “Imagine the moment of revelation however you wish, but one thing is certain – the sheer, exhilarating thrill of finding the unpublished poems of Iris Murdoch.  

A recent article in The Sunday Times describes the poems as ‘cataloguing her tempestuous hidden  love life’, and many of them detail her emotional turmoil as a bisexual woman. 

The original materials are now held in the Iris Murdoch Collections in Kingston University Archives. 

The book is co-edited by Anne Rowe, Rachel Hirschler, Miles Leeson and Frances White and will be available to buy from Penguin.