Over the course of Under the Net, Iris Murdoch draw an important emphasis on silence and how it related to truth. Iris Murdoch does this by showing the character development of Jake. Jake is a character who seems to be wandering around from the homes of his friends with no real goals other than trying to find a place to stay. Over the course of the book Jake is able to come to the realization about what life is really about and start to get his life together. To Jake silence and truth go hand in hand and the lines between the two easily become blurred. Throughout the book Jake is has to deal with not only the silence of the people and events that are around him but also how his own silence affects his life.
After Jake is forced to leave his
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Lefty started questioning why Jake was only translating the works of other instead of writing his own stories. This truth somewhat scared Jake but he was able to reply swiftly. Lefty Todd somehow manages to get Jake to take a swim in the River of Thames. In the book Jake says, “I swam to one of the barges, and clung on to the cable for a while, throwing my head back to scan a panorama of blue-black sky and black and silver water, and stilling my body until the silence entered me with a rush.” By being able to take in the silence of the night by himself at the barge, Jake was able to analyze the conversation he had had with Lefty. Jake started to question his writing abilities. Being able to swim in the river by himself helped to clear Jake’s mind and it helped his character grow. By being by himself he was able to fully take in the truth of what Lefty Todd was saying and he used this truth to once again start getting his life together. Silence and truth are main topics in Under the Net. Both silence and truth ultimately help Jake get out from under the net that has been keeping him down. He found that silence can actually benefit him he takes the extra time to actually think about what the truth in what is around him. By doing this he was able to start progressing as a character and pull himself out of the slump that he was