How we cite our quotes: (Part.Section.Paragraph)
Quote #7
I hope that you and Rachel have forgiven me for yesterday. Although summoned I was nevertheless an intruder. You will understand me and I need exclaim no more on that point. One does not want witnesses of one's trouble however ephemeral it may be. The outsider cannot understand and his very thoughts are an impertinence. I write to say that I have no thoughts, except for my affection for you and Rachel and my certainty that all is well with you. I have never been an adherent of your brand of curiosity! (1.5.7)
Let's assume for a minute that we can believe everything that Bradley Pearson has told us about Arnold and Rachel Baffin's marriage. If Bradley is telling the truth, what do these comments suggest about his sense of his own responsibilities here? Is Bradley genuinely doing his best to be a good friend to both Arnold and Rachel, or is he simply trying to avoid getting drawn into a messy conflict?
Quote #8
Marriage is a curious institution, as I have already remarked. I cannot quite see how it can be possible. People who boast of happy marriages are, I submit, usually self-deceivers, if not actually liars. The human soul is not framed for continued proximity, and the result of this enforced neighbourhood is often an appalling loneliness for which the rules of the game forbid assuagement. There is nothing like the bootless solitude of those who are caged together. (1.10.1)
What is one exception to this argument, according to Bradley Pearson himself? In other words, what kind of "continued proximity" does Bradley value and appreciate?
Quote #9
You don't know what you're saying, Bradley. You've got dignity. Solitary people can have dignity. A married woman has no dignity, no thoughts which really stand up separately. She's a subdivision of her husband's mind, and he can release misery into her consciousness whenever he pleases, like ink spreading into water. (1.21.20)
Although Bradley Pearson has a habit of making terribly demeaning comments about the middle-aged women in his life, on the whole, The Black Prince is sympathetic to the unique problems that married middle-aged women face in a patriarchal society. How much of this sympathy and insight can we readers ascribe to Bradley himself, and how much seems to be coming from Iris Murdoch's own authorial perspective?