I knew nothing about this book, beyond the information anyone can glean from the cover print. The book was written in 1954 by Iris Murdoch, who wrote more than 20 books. This one takes place in London, presumably during the time that it was written. I found Under the Net to be more entertaining than I expected. The main character, Jake Donaghue, is a man who is afraid of hard work, who never has a job or a place to live, but manages to live well off the generosity of this friends. The only job he seems to do is as a translator for a french author. Jake wants to be a writer in his own right, but as mentioned before, he's not very good at actually working on something.
Jake's life changes when he is once again without a place to live, and gets in contact with his old girlfriend and her movie-star sister. This brings him back into contact with Hugo, the man who he broke off contact with years before. Jake has to come to terms with a variety of opinions he holds about these friends from his past before he can face his future.
I really enjoyed reading this book. It is hard to explain how funny the book is - there are parts that seem like some kind of movie caper or heist. Jake's character is very well drawn - you root for him even when he's behaving like an idiot. His friends are interesting and varied, and not like anyone I know. And once Mister Mars, the movie dog, joins him (in a very funny kidnap-the-dog scene), I was loving it. Written by someone less talented, this book could have been terrible, but Murdoch does a wonderful job telling the story with both humor and drama. ( )

I loved this novel! I suppose someone reading it in a scholarly manner would see it as some type of exploration of existentialist philosophy. I read it as some terrific writing of an interesting story with some hilarious parts. Slacker narrator Jake makes the story with his impulsive decisions, and explication of needing to fulfill his innermost wants immediately (whatever they may be at that moment) and never being satisfied. Particularly hilarious is when Jake steals a celebrity dog whom he ends up growing quite fond of (I bet no college professor ever saw this as a “boy and his dog” story).

“Women think that beauty lies in approximation to a harmonious norm. The only reason why they fail to make themselves indistinguishably similar is that they lack the time and the money and the technique.” (p. 11)

“You may think it odd that two ordinary law-abiding citizens like myself and Finn should have troubled to provide ourselves with such an article. But we have found by experience that there are a surprising number of occasions in a society such as ours when simply in defence of one’s own rights … one needs to get through a locked door to which one possesses no key.” (p. 137)

“The twisting halls of falsehood never cease to appal me, but I constantly enter them; possibly because I see them as short corridors which lead out again into the sun: though perhaps, this is the only fatal lie.” (p. 206)

“Daytime sleep is a cursed slumber from which one wakes in despair. The sun will not tolerate it.” (p. 221)

“”Some situations can’t be unraveled,’ said Hugo, ‘they just have to be dropped. The trouble with you, Jake, is that you want to understand everything sympathetically. I can’t be done. One must just blunder on. Truth lies in blundering on.’” (p. 257) ( )

Pointless. 260 pages about a guy with stalker tendencies wandering around London. I would have given it one star but this was Murdoch's first novel, and she can write. She just couldn't develop a plot at this point in her career. ( )

Bought 19 Jan 1995

First in my A Murdoch A Month reading challenge - so I won't give too much away as Ali and Audrey haven't finished it yet.

An interesting first novel, quite light and easy to read, although it actually contains a lot of the themes Murdoch will develop and concentrate on as we work our way through her novels. I had a lot of fun trying to pick out some of these so we can bear them in mind and see how they all connect. Also a fun read in its own right. ( )

"Under the Net" was Iris Murdoch's first novel [published 1954], and it's a much more lighthearted affair than many of the novels that would follow. The hero of the story is Jake, a penniless writer in his thirties who makes some sort of living translating French novels into English. At the start of the novel he is about to be turned out of his (rent-free) home because Madge, his landlady, has become engaged to wideboy bookmaker Sammy Starfield.

Jake is a romantic ideal, perhaps - the impecunious free spirit for whom something always seems to come along. On the journey we meet Jake's former lover, Anna, and her sister Sadie. Through them he comes into contact with Hugo Belfounder. Hugo and Jake first met at a cold-cure clinic, and Jake used their philosophical discussions as the basis for a book. Assuming that Hugo would be cross with Jake for utilising their conversations in this manner, Jake had ceased to have any contact with Hugo, although Hugo clearly means a great deal to him.

There are several bizarre, farcical scenes that either give the story some humour or detract from the serious 'message' of the book, depending on your viewpoint. I get the impression Murdoch herself wasn't quite sure what effect she was going for - which is perhaps to be expected in a first novel. Entertaining but a little lacking structurally, perhaps. [July 2006] ( )