Nuns and Soldiers Read Free

it can lead to a heroic self-abandonment, as, constantly disregarded, the self-important ego dwindles away.
    The novel concentrates, however, on the story of Gertrude and Tim, who, like many of the heroes of mythology, has to undergo a series of ordeals, before he can make his love for Gertrude a viable reality. One peak experience is never enough; it has to be creatively integrated into daily life. A crucial moment in Tim’s spiritual journey is his final departure from Daisy, who has been his companion for years. For once, Tim is acting selflessly and against his own desires. He is deliberately walking into a terrifying vacuum. Yet both Tim and Daisy experience his departure as a moment of grace, but also as a death. They have deliberately chosen the annihilation of their relationship and, inevitably, are putting to death a crucial part of themselves. They can thus share a moment of revelation. When we look at somebody with our own well-being constantly in mind, we cannot see the person as he or she really is. Our vision is distorted by a subjectivity which is destructive and exploitative. When Tim finally has the courage to set Daisy free, he sees her transfigured. They no longer view each other through the prism of their own selfishness. Each feels that the other has become a god. They have seen what is sacred in the other.
    Finally, Tim has to undergo ordeal by water. This is a frequent motif in Murdoch’s novels; characters often have to endure some watery trial before they can see their way clearly. In many cultures, the symbol of immersion in the deep represents a rite of passage, the emergence of a new reality or a profound transformation. We see this in the biblical myth of the Israelites who escape from slavery by passing through the miraculously parted Sea of Reeds. The Christian sacrament of baptism is another instance of this universal symbolism. Tim falls into a dangerous canal when, disregarding his own safety, he tries to rescue a drowning dog. This moment of gratuitous and disinterested compassion leads to his salvation. Swept along by the canal into the depths of the earth, he emerges safely into the sunlight, battered and dishevelled, and makes his final, successful return to Gertrude.
    Human beings need salvation. This does not mean ‘going to heaven’, a concept which both Anne and Guy dismiss as an anti-religious idea. As we live our precarious lives on the brink of the void, constantly coming closer to a state of nonbeing, we are all too often aware of our fragility. But we will not be rescued by a supernatural deity nor by the crucified Christ. We have to make an effort of imagination to save ourselves. Murdoch’s novel shows that, in Robert Browning’s words, we have ‘finite hearts that yearn’, but, as St Augustine observed, it is this yearning that makes the heart run deep. It seems to be characteristic of the human mind to have experiences and to imagine realities that transcend it. Love, like religion, may be a delusion, but if we are sufficiently ingenious, it can sometimes save us. The Count tells Anne that for years his unrequited love for Gertrude brought him some consolation. ‘I did it all, I enacted both sides of the relation, and this could be done because she was inaccessible.’ He adds: ‘We dream that we are loved, because otherwise we would die.’ At the end of the novel, Anne reflects that this is also true of the religious quest. We imagine God or Christ to save ourselves from the bleak realities of our existence, but if it is truly creative this effort can itself bring a measure of relief. Jean-Paul Sartre defined the imagination as the ability to think of what is not there. It is, therefore, the chief religious faculty, since it enables us to conceive the eternally absent God. But in order to glimpse this transcendence, we must give ourselves away. It seems that the discipline of the nun and the soldier, which requires an absolute self-abandonment, brings its own