About
The Murdoch Chronicles
2026—Present
Thomasina Uhlmeister
Archival pigment and oil on canvas
20 x 16 inches
2026
First published in 1975, Iris Murdoch’s seventeenth novel, A Word Child, is a dazzling psychological study of madness, guilt, regret—and love.
That language lies at the core of this story is key. “I discovered words, and words were my salvation,” notes the book’s central character, Hilary Burde, who is trapped in his own linguistic labyrinth (and intentionally not included).
To employ the linguistic tools of artificial intelligence to dig into the relationship between language and image is a fundamentally creative act.
It is also a human one.
No one knew this better than Murdoch, who wrote:
The self, the place where we live, is a place of illusion.
