"I think I shall live."

What a delightful read! A few months ago I picked up this book, read seventy or so pages, and then put it down because I was bored with it. I don't know, back then I must have been impatient! But I picked it up again this past week, read it in a few days, and was delighted. It is especially interesting to read this book after having read A Passage to India. There are endless similarities between the two... both in theme, and in conception of character. I notice that Mr. Beebe is much like the schoolmaster (and close friend and confidant of Dr. Aziz) - I forget his name, but he's one of the main characters. They are both wise men, unentangled by the romances, indifferent to women, observing from the outside. They seem to me to be the portals through which E.M. Forster's homosexuality enters the novels. There are countless other similarities, but they are not worth drowning this post in.

But perhaps what is worth a discussion are Forster's views on the two genders. From the two novels of his that I have read, Forster doesn't seen to have any strong female characters and, on the contrary, his female characters seem to be either naive or superficial. Both Miss Quested and Lucy Honeychurch undergo much disillusionment in the novels. The rest of the female characters seem to care more about delicacy than beauty, and on the whole are very superficial. To examine the way he conceives male characters, one should look at Dr. Aziz and George Emerson, Mr. Beebe and the schoolmaster (oh, how I hate that I forget his name). Dr. Aziz and George Emerson are both passionate men who are right in their principles, but are unable to accomodate the prejudiced views of their environment. Mr. Beebe and the schoolmaster are both wise men, observers, indifferent to the petty women in their environments, providing the closest insight into Forster himself. One can see, then, how Forster's personal indifference to women manifests itself in the novels.

I haven't read much Forster, but I didn't think he had a "personal indifference" to women. I'm thinking of Howard's End and Margaret Schliegel(?). She seems to me to be the main character in the book, (apart from the house itself), and appears to be a character we empathise with, the nearest thing to a heroine in the book. I like her sister too. I don't think he's indifferent to Lucy Honeychurch either. She's rather splendid, ditching Cecil and going with her heart and Emerson. That was rather a brave thing to do, going against the social mores of the time. I think that you may be reading more into the fact that he was homosexual by stating (wrongly in my view), that he seems to have a thing against women. Just my personal view.

I don't think he has a thing against women, I just think he's indifferent towards them. Many of his female characters have to go through the process of being "re-educated," learning to penetrate surface appearances and superficialities. Both Lucy Honeychurch and Miss Quested undergo this process. While he does portray Lucy as splendid, it is the male characters that are unveiled to be more than what they seem, and it is also the male characters who possess Forster's wisdom. Since Forster refrains from representing overt homosexual relationships in his novels (except for that one which was published posthumously), it makes sense that the characters with whom he most empathizes are the single, widowed, or celibate men - for instance, Mr. Beebe, old Mr. Emerson, the schoolmaster, Dr. Aziz. I believe that these characters are the ones who speak for the author.

Also, I didn't find Lucy and George's love affair to be terribly romantic. It is no Liz and Darcy, after all. In fact, I found George and Cecil Vyse to be much more interesting than Lucy. The only light in which Lucy shines is that which is cast on her by a male character (for example, when Mr. Beebe remarks on Lucy, "if she would only live like she plays, there would be much excitement for us all" - I paraphrase).

I simply don't know of any female characters in Forster who display wisdom, or who say anything stirring. There are female characters who are disillusioned, or who overcome social norms, but these are almost archetypal in Forster. But the characters who really strike a chord with me, the reader, seem to be the ones whom Forster identifies the most with.