Moral Fragility and the Illusion of Success in Sudha Murthy’s              House of Cards

Mehrunnisha S

Moral Fragility and the Illusion of Success in Sudha Murthy’s House of Cards

Author(s)	Ms. Mehrunnisha S
Country	India
Abstract	Abstract In her book, House of Cards (2013), Sudha Murthy is a very subtle and yet incisive reflection on professional ambition and moral weakness in the context of the modern Indian middle-class world. It is set in the context of the neoliberal dreams and social mobility, as the ethical decay of Dr. Sanjay unfolds as his unremitting drive to achieve material success gradually undermines his sense of ethical sensitivity and affectivity. By contrast, his wife, Mridula, is an element of moral persistence; through her unnoticed sacrifices, she underlines stability in the house and allows moral performance to continue. This paper cross-examines the text with the philosophical perspectives of the virtue ethics and liquid modernity developed by Alasdair MacIntyre and Zygmunt Bauman respectively, therefore, positing that Murthy foresees the inherent unsteadiness of success that does not rely on moral values. The House of Cards is a metaphor that eloquently explains how success based on a superficial frivolity of wealth, status, fame, instead of virtuous quality like honesty, accountability, etc. can be as shaky as a house of cards. Through foregrounding gendered labour and dissociation with emotional affect, this novel is a commentary on existing discourses of neoliberalism that equate success with accumulation. The paper then places House of Cards in the context of the most influential ethical literature in the Indian English fiction which questions the aspects of ambition, ethics and sacrifice of human beings in the name of professional achievement.
Keywords	Moral Realism, Virtue, Ethics, Neoliberalism, Gender, Materialism.
Field	Arts
Published In	Volume 8, Issue 3, May-June 2026
Published On	2026-05-22

View / Download PDF File

E-ISSN 2582-2160

doi

CrossRef DOI is assigned to each research paper published in our journal.

IJFMR DOI prefix is
10.36948/ijfmr

Downloads

Research Paper Format Copyright Permission Form and Undertaking Form Cover Page Vol 8 Isu 3 Cover Page Vol 8 Isu 2 Cover Page Vol 8 Isu 2

All research papers published on this website are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, and all rights belong to their respective authors/researchers.

CC-BY-SA

About IJFMR Fees & Payment Current Issue Publication Archive	Submit Research Paper Track Submission Status Publication Guidelines Publication Ethics Peer Review & Plagiarism	Join as a Reviewer Editors & Reviewers Reviewer Referral Program Get Reviewer Membership Certi.	Website/Journal Policies Usage Policy Content Policies Privacy Policy

Contact Us		+91-9687-828-838	editor@ijfmr.com

International Journal For Multidisciplinary Research

A Widely Indexed Open Access Peer Reviewed Multidisciplinary Bi-monthly Scholarly International Journal

Moral Fragility and the Illusion of Success in Sudha Murthy’s House of Cards

Share this