{"product_id":"a-severed-head","title":"A Severed Head","description":"\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" id=\"docs-internal-guid-6f43635b-7fff-b2bd-571a-3875478df361\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"\u003eWhere to begin with Iris Murdoch.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"\u003eIris Murdoch’s darkest novel is also her funniest. Novelist William Sutcliffe put it best when he noted \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"\u003eA Severed Head\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"\u003e has “less philosophising and more shagging than Murdoch's other books”. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"\u003eMartin Lynch-Gibbon, a well-off wine merchant in London, believes he has arranged his life neatly: a civilised marriage, a discreet mistress, a respected psychoanalyst brother-in-law. Then his wife announces she is leaving him for the psychoanalyst. What begins as bourgeois farce turns into something stranger – a study in self-deception, humiliation and the unstable nature of desire.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"\u003eThis seventies Penguin paperback edition ties in with the forgotten film adaptation of Murdoch’s novel (with a screenplay by Frederic Raphael, who would later go on to adapt \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"\u003eEyes Wide Shu\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"\u003et with Stanley Kubrick), with its surreal sepia still on the cover.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Jouissance","offers":[{"title":"Penguin Film Tie-In","offer_id":57894699303293,"sku":null,"price":25.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0825\/6054\/9167\/files\/9_cea9860b-feed-4e9c-b671-04c5155804f0.png?v=1772627428","url":"https:\/\/shop.jouissanceparfums.com\/products\/a-severed-head","provider":"Jouissance","version":"1.0","type":"link"}