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Structure, Symbol, and Theme in E. M. Forster's A Passage to India
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
For the thirty years since its publication, E. M. Forster's A Passage to India has enjoyed the somewhat paradoxical status of being valued without being understood. It is generally recognized as one of the finest literary productions of this century; it is also commonly thought to be one of the most puzzling. No doubt, part of the reason for our difficulty in interpreting it is that the literary problems it raises are continuous with its philosophical problems, or, to put it another way, that the obscurities of the novel duplicate or disappear into the obscurities of life itself. We cannot, of course, expect to explain the latter mystery before attempting to explain the former, nor need it be necessary; yet, if we are to succeed in interpretation, we must guard against that most common critical error of assuming that our own philosophical predilections must apply universally. As Earl R. Wasserman recently observed, “Our failure to grasp as total and integrated experiences such works as … E. M. Forster's A Passage to India results from our not having succeeded as yet in bringing to these works the proper controlling cosmos, for each cosmos is the creation of the author.” Discovering the nature of this “cosmos” and relating it to structure, symbol, and theme of the novel will be the concern of the following pages.
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1955
References
page 934 note 1 The Finer Tone: Keats' Major Poems (Baltimore, 1953), p. 228.
page 934 note 2 E. M. Forster (New York, 1943), “The Novels of E. M. Forster,” American Review, ix (Summer 1937), 226–251; “E. M. Forster,” Nation, cxlvii (22 Oct. 1938), 412–416.
page 934 note 3 Rhythm in the Novel (Toronto, 1950).
page 934 note 4 “E. M. Forster's Mrs. Moore: Some Suggestions,” PQ, xxxii (Oct. 1953), 388–396. 5 Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson (London, 1934), p. 122.
page 934 note 6 “A Passage to India: Analysis and Reevaluation,” PMLA, lxviii, iv (Sept. 1953), 641–657.
page 934 note 7 In his biography of G. Lowes Dickinson, Forster seems to show no particular interest in his friend's Hegelian studies. 8 The Hill of Devi (New York, 1953).
page 934 note 9 Harbrace Modern Classics Ed. (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1924), p. 257. Italics mine. Quotations will be from this edition.
page 934 note 10 See, e.g., S. Radhakrishnan, Indian Philosophy (London, 1929), pp. 552–574. Also Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophies of India, ed. Joseph Campbell (New York, 1951), pp. 403—409 et passim.
page 934 note 11 The Great Philosopliers: The Eastern World (London, 1952), pp. 158—159. Historically, these attitudes developed in the order in which Tornlin presents them, the Karmamarga belonging to the earliest recorded history of Indian culture. The Inanamarga represents a somewhat more sophisticated culture of a later date, while the Bhaktimarga is estimated as the development of a period preceding the birth of Christ by some 600 or 800 years. It is significant that the Bhagavad-Gita, the most highly admired of Hindu scriptures, which provides the authority for the Bhaktimarga, does not do so to the exclusion of the other two doctrines. Most scholars accept the point of view that the Gita is an eclectic document which attempts the harmonious reconciliation of all three ways of salvation.
page 934 note 12 Another purely formal function of the threefold division should be noted in passing. Forster's deep interest in musical form and its relation to fiction offers support to the view that the three parts of the novel correspond to the three divisions of the sonata form in which themes of East and West are stated, developed, dexterously interwoven, and finally brought to a harmonious conclusion in the coda of the final pages of the book.
page 934 note 13 This effort to identify, to label the cause of the accident, Forster had prepared for earlier in the scene at the polo field where Ronny and Adela had pointlessly attempted to name the green bird (p. 85). Both of these events are, of course, closely related to their plans for sanctifying a shaky and uncertain affection for each other by the label of marriage. And if we carry the significance of this pattern of images to its extreme, we see that it symbolizes the attempt to wed Britain and India, East and West, without the sanction of mutual affection, nor the hope of anything more than the label of marriage to result from it.
page 934 note 14 For Forster's grounds for distinction, see Aspects of the Novel, p. 239.
page 934 note 15 “The Novels of E. M. Forster,” The Death of the Moth (New York, 1942), p. 168.
page 934 note 16 Hindu philosophy, it should be understood, is not all of one piece. Though not quite so diversified as Western philosophy, it comprehends at least six distinct interpretations of its ancient Vedic writings. When I speak in general terms of Hindu philosophy, as indeed I must, I shall intend what is common to all the Brahmanical systems; or, where that is impossible, I shall follow Shankara, the most widely admired of the interpreters.
page 934 note 17 Sacred Books of the East, ed. F. Max Millier (Oxford, 1900), xv, 10.
page 934 note 18 Although it is spelled “Om,” the syllable stands for the letters A, U, M which in turn stand for the threefold manifestation of the godhead: Brahma, the creator; Vishnu, the preserver; and Siva, the destroyer. It must be remembered, of course, that deity remains one in spite of its manifold emanations.
page 934 note 19 Schopenhauer himself readily avows this connection in his preface to the first edition of The World as Will and Idea.
page 934 note 20 The World as Will and Idea, trans. R. B. Haldane and J. Kemp, 7th ed. (London, n.d.), i, 454.
page 934 note 21 Compare Schopenhauer: “This is nature's great doctrine of immortality, which seeks to teach us that there is no radical difference between sleep and death, but the one endangers existence just as little as the other” (III, 267 and i, 364).
page 934 note 22 Cf. “This need for excitement of the will manifests itself very specially in the discovery and support of card-playing, which is quite peculiarly the expression of the miserable side of humanity” (i, 406). That the game should be Patience is appropriate in view of the philosophical context.
page 934 note 23 Cf. “Life, the visible world, the phenomenon, is only the mirror of the will” (i, 354).
page 934 note 24 Mark ix.41 ff. “And if thy hand offend thee cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched: Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.”
page 934 note 25 This interpretation of the Marabar symbol is also supported by Forster's description and name of the highest summit, Kawa Dol. “The boulder because of its hollowness sways in the wind, and even moves when a crow perches upon it: hence its name and the name of its stupendous pedestal: the Kawa Dol” (pp. 125–126). In Hindustani, the phrase, Kawa Dol, means the crow's swing. However, if Kawa Dol were taken to be a transliteration of Sanskrit, it would approximate a meaning of vacillating, uncertain or limited knowledge.
page 934 note 28 Austin Warren reports that “Dickinson, as well as others, asked Forster, What really happened in the caves?” then declares, “the author does not say” (p. 246).
page 934 note 27 Aspects of the Novel, p. 242.
page 934 note 28 Howards End (New York, 1948), p. 223.
page 934 note 29 “The Novels of E. M. Forster,” Nineteenth Century and After (Nov. 1934), p. 589.
page 934 note 30 The Writings of E. M. Forster (New York, 1938), p. 203.
page 934 note 31 Cf. The Bill of Devi, p. 176.