Throughout the novel, The Black Prince, I wholeheartedly
believed what Bradley told me. As the reader reading a tale in first person I
felt I had to believe him. In lying to me he would be lying to himself, and
what type of person would do that? I sure wouldn’t! At least not intentionally.
There were several times in the novel where I found certain facts a little
difficult to believe, the most important would be how Bradley had all those
women just begging to get in his pants. He’s self-described and interpreted by the
reader as a bitter old man. He describes himself as “thin and tall, just over
six feet, fairish and not yet bald, with light fine silky rather faded straight
hair. [He has] a bland diffident nervous sensitive face and thin lips and blue
eyes” (Murdoch 15-16). That description does not sound very tempting to me, but
apparently Rachel (a married woman), Christian (his ex-wife), and Julian (a naïve
young woman) just can’t seem to get enough of him and are willing to risk
anything and everything to be with him…not to mention Francis hits on him and
constantly ties to convince reader and Bradley that Bradley is gay. Bradley’s
manic personality change when he falls in love with Julian is also
disconcerting to the reader…is he crazy or is he sane (a very Hamlet-like
confliction).
(I like this photo of Hamlet—it shows his shattered self well)
However, it is in the postscripts that I completely lose
faith in Bradley’s reliability. He admits that during the trial of Arnold’s
Baffin’s murder that (under oath!) he changed his story over and over again: “As
the time went on I tried various attitudes, said various things, changed my
mind, told the truth, then lied, then broke down, was impassive, then devious,
then abject…Perhaps at moments I almost believed that I had killed [Arnold],
just as at moments perhaps [Rachel] almost believed that she had not” (Murdoch
374).
It also doesn’t help Bradley’s case that Christian causally
discredits him at every turn and Rachel belittles his every account. Julian,
possibly the one person the reader could rely on chooses instead to state she
cannot accurately recall the change of events that transpired. The readers are
left to decide for themselves. Personally, I want to believe Bradley, but I do
not feel he’s told me the whole truth…
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