Mapping the Individual: A Psychogeographical Reading of Iris Murdoch’s Under the Net

Introduced firstly by Guy Debord, the founder of the Letterist International, in 1955, psychogeography intersects with the study of the psychological and emotional effects of an urban city on individuals. Proposing that both space and psychology complete one another, psychogeography, as a term juxtaposing psychology and geography, seeks to unearth the estrangement and the dehumanizing impacts of global urbanism consolidated by advanced capitalism and industrialization. In this sense, psychogeography focuses mostly on the act of walking so as to comprehend the ongoing conflict between the mind and city and suggests walking as a conscious activity can function as a protest and subversion against the commodification and repressive constraints of the city. Likewise, Iris Murdoch's debut novel titled Under the Net captures the story of Jake Donaghue and his unstable psychology alienated and decentred by the formation of an urban city, that is, London. Thus, this study aims to analyze Iris Murdoch's Under the Net in order to emphasize the fragmentation and displacement of individuals in accordance with the global urbanism by employing a psychogeographical lens.