| Summary: | The genesis of this thesis was the observation that water played a role in many Murdoch novels as did accounts of the wanton destruction of valuable possessions. Study of the works of AS Byatt revealed a similar interest in the human impulse to destroy and in the Byatt tetralogy published over a period of more than two decades fire is often the means of destruction. My academic training to date has taught me to attempt to account for such observations. I concluded that Murdoch's obsession with the imagery and activity of water and Byatt's with that of fire reflect their awareness that, despite the wide acceptance of the death of the idea of God, humans as individuals and in community still need a religious life - ritual, ceremony, nurture, blessing and a moral order to control the human impulse to destruction.
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