Ask the Author: Bryan Murphy

“Ask me a question.” Bryan Murphy

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Bryan Murphy My favourite literary couple is Paul and Miriam in DH Lawrence's Sons and Lovers, because they got me into university. My dream was to study Social Psychology at one of the two places in the UK it was then possible to do so: the University of Sussex. I got an interview with the formidable but friendly Marie Jahoda, during which I was asked about my A-level studies, in particular Sons and Lovers, and whether I thought Lawrence's alter ego suffered from an Oedipus complex. I answered that that was too glib a solution, and that more complex factors must have been interacting, which was what made the relationship interesting. Faced with a stream of candidates who equated psychology with Freud, the good Prof, who had set up a department that wanted psychology treated as a science, must have deemed my answer half decent, for an offer duly arrived, and three interesting years later I had a degree fit for no obvious profession (the British Psychological Association refused to recognise the course because it did not devote enough time to the study of rats).
Bryan Murphy Hello, Marylee. I tend to set my stories in places I know well: Brighton for "Madeleine's Drug", Turin for much of "Goodbye, Padania" and Zipolite for "Houlihan's Wake". I hope that the specific setting adds extra interest to all those stories. However, to see them with clearer vision, I often set the tale in the future, when they will have changed, for better or for worse.
Bryan Murphy Develop a thick skin, and keep writing.
Bryan Murphy Knowing that people are reading what you have written.

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