The Unicorn is immediately a kind of frame narrative: a train story itself, which begins with an arrival at a remote railway station and ends with our two narrative guides departing âas the express carried them away across the central plainâ, leaving behind the dramatic story of Hannah Crean-Smith, the unicorn of the novelâs title.
Murdochâs great love of the Flaying of Marsyas ignited Phillipsâ inspiration. âWhen the National Portrait Gallery commissioned me to paint her portrait I recalled our conversationâ, he said, and he âstarted a fairly hasty copy of the picture to act as a backdrop so that she might sit in front of the head of Marsyas.’ Phillips sketched in the Titian with broad brushstrokes; in contrast, he rendered the image of Murdoch herself with great precision and imbued it with a translucent, otherworldly light
At first glance, Malcolm may seem like a surprising choice as a guide to Murdochâs novels, because he is best rememberedâor so the anecdotal evidence I have gathered suggestsâas a Murdoch parodist rather than critic.
Iris Murdoch met the painter Harry Weinberger (1924-2009) by chance in the mid-1970s and in him she instantly recognised a kindred spirit. For more than two decades, they maintained an intimate friendship and rigorous intellectual discourse, centred on sustained discussion of the practice, teaching and morality of art.