FORSTER

He wrote at the beginning of the 20's, but he is not a modernist.

He rejected all human conventions and everything which limited the expression of deep, sincere, human feelings and thoughts; according to him English society was very limited because spontaneity was not accepted. Each person had to control himself and to conform with social conventions, with what was considered acceptable.

Forster believed that:

We have to get rid of all those moral codes which present our personality from developing fully;

We should reach armony, a balance, of heart (feelings), body (sensations) and mind. We cannot avoid or limit the free expression of heart, body and mind.

Human relationship are extremely important and every difference of culture, religion, sex, social status can be superate (overtaken/overcome); it is possible to reach a sort of communication among people. It is not necessary to share the same ideas to create a good relationship so he was against discriminations of any kind: respectability, ipocrisy, materialism, industrialisation, and he was in favour of tolerance, human nature, freedom.

The meaning of life has to be found in the concrete life, through sensation and experience. Forster's intention is to show how a particular truth in life can be understood by analysing sensations. That's why we have a visional understanding; we don't use logic or reason but only perception.

He was a traditional writer, realistic, but also a symbolic writer. What is the innovating in his books is the exploration of the personality. Stress on the human relationship and on the analysis of what happens inside the character. Characters are seen both from the outside (what others think of one) and inside (what the characters sees and how lives his situations)

The distinction between FLAT and ROUND CHARACTERS was made by him.

Some of his books are set in Italy.

A PASSAGE TO INDIA

The Indian town mentioned (Chandrapore) is fictitious, not real.

The story can be divided into 3 parts:

1^st part: the mosque

2^nd part: the Cave

3^rd part: the temple

The 1^st and the 3^rd referred to religion: covered places where religious ceremonies are held.

Cave is a covered place too, which represents primitive life, but it can represents the subconscious. In the cave every sounds and words that you produce becomes an echo and the is always the same: "auboum". There is no difference of sounds as well as in primitive life there was no difference between people. So the difference between Indians and English did not exist inside the Cave: every person had the same dignity.

Azela entered the Cave and experienced the echo. We don't know what exactly happened, but she came out puzzled and scared. The reader does not know what happened to her, so he7she images that something terrible happened to her.

She said that she was physically attacked by someone, but she couldn't recognise the man because it was too dark.

Then there was  a trial and during it Adela said that she couldn't remember anything, and she wasn't sure anymore. So Aziz, who was considered guilty, is released.

In this way all the British community is against the girls. What happens inside the Cave is a  mystery. If the cave is a symbol of subconscious, it may be that the girl found herself facing her own subconscious. So what was hidden inside herself was suddenly revealed and so may be what was hidden was her fear of being attacked. This fear manifested itself with such a strength that girl thought it was real.

Mrs Moore loses her faith in human relationships; she realised that her life is empty and she was interested in what happened outside her.