The Rory Gilmore Book Club discussion

The book for April is A Passage to India by E.M. Forster. Discuss it here!

(I'll try to be back soon with some info about the author and the book. Right now I'm fighting off a cold, so it might take a day or two before I feel up to it, but don't let it keep you from starting discussions!)

Going to start this one today! I'm pretty excited about it.

Me, too! :-)
I just finished my other book and will take up the "Passage" tonight. I'm so looking forward to reading Forster again! :)

So am I, I've read a couple of his books Maurice and A Room With a View and really liked them both. This one's been sitting on my bookshelf unread for quite some time after I bought it in a second-hand bookshop, so I'm glad I'm finally getting around to reading it!

About the author: Edward Morgan Forster (1 January 1879 – 7 June 1970), was an English novelist, short story writer, essayist and librettist. He is known best for his ironic and well-plotted novels examining class difference and hypocrisy and also the attitudes towards gender and homosexuality in early 20th-century British society. Forster's humanistic impulse toward understanding and sympathy may be aptly summed up in the epigraph to his 1910 novel Howards End: "Only connect".

More information: Online Network
Wikipedia
Aspects of E.M. Forster

About the book, based on Wikipedia and the Aspects of E.M. Forster site:

A Passage to India (1924) is a novel by E. M. Forster set against the backdrop of the British Raj and the Indian independence movement in the 1920s. It was selected as one of the 100 great works of English literature by the Modern Library and won the 1924 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction. Time magazine included the novel in its "TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005".

It is a picture of society in India under the British Raj, of the clash between East and West, and of the prejudices and misunderstandings that foredoomed goodwill. Criticized at first for anti-British and possibly inaccurate bias, it has been praised as a superb character study of people of one race by a writer of another.

More information: Wikipedia page
page on Aspects of E.M. Forster (Note! These pages may have spoilers to the plot. I didn't read more than the beginning because I wanted to avoid spoilers, so I don't know, but they seem to contain synopses.)

I think an understanding of the British rule of India might be helpful here. Does anybody know anything about this subject? I don't, and I'm having a hard time finding useful info on the web.

I haven't had time to look for any information yet, but I can't really say how much information one needs before I've read the book. Perhaps the book will tell everything you need to know, or perhaps there will be things that everyone at the time knew but don't know nowadays. I'd assume the basic things about colonialism by European powers are enough, though.

There seem to be extensive enough Wikipedia articles which also provide links to other sources: here is the article on the British Raj, meaning the British colonial rule in India, which is probably the most significant for this book. Here is the general page for the History of colonialism.

But if you wish, I can give you a brief overview of how I view the most significant political/cultural background to this matter (without having read the book yet, so I don't know what will actually provide important). I can tell more about colonialism in general than about the British rule of India specifically, though. I studied those things a bit in the course of my studies (I majored in International Relations, and did a lot of European history of the 19th century at high school), but I'm hardly an expert. I probably have some idea of the basic issues behind it, but for more detailed history it's better to consult the links on the pages I gave above.

Thank you Katri, for moderating the discussion (again) this month :)

I'm looking forward to reading this too but might get a late start. I've read only one Forster before, A Room with a View.

The book has been really interesting so far. The historical fiction depicted in this story is fascinating. Learning about how India was under British Rule and seeing the treatment and reaction of the two races is very exciting.

Dhvani wrote: "The book has been really interesting so far. The historical fiction depicted in this story is fascinating. Learning about how India was under British Rule and seeing the treatment and reaction of the two races is very exciting."

This is exactly how I feel. I enjoy reading it so much! I feel like I know nothing about this time in India and am constantly trying to find out some more about it.

The book is written very clearly, I think. And it captures a certain ... I don't know how to express it really... aloofness on both sides, that Adela and Mrs. Moore are not feeling (yet?) and act against it.
My edition has a lot of background information in it, but I'm still kind of having a hard time getting it all together in one picture. And I love the cover of my edition, too:


I'm having too many other things I have to do right now, so I can't really read it very fast. So I'm not finished yet with the book, but I'd love to discuss it already. Maybe we could discuss it in parts until we are all done? (I don't want to read any spoilers...).
Anybody else interested? :-) We could for example divide it into three parts á 12 chapters or something?

If others also feel that we should discuss it in parts, sure. I've only just started myself, because there were some unfinished books I wanted to get done first, but I hope to progress soon. Since the book is itself divided into three parts, perhaps that would be enough? Though the first two parts are much longer than the last one, so it wouldn't be a very even division.

How's everybody's reading going? Any thoughts you want to share yet?

I'm about halfway through Part 1. I'm finding the reading rather slow-going, because while I enjoy Forster's style, it's somehow rather... well, it's concise in a way that means there's a lot even in a small amount of text, and there's a lot to think about, so I feel the most comfortable reading just one or two chapters a day, and on all days I don't have the brain presence for this kind of book. I'm liking it and very interested to go on, though.

So far at least I don't feel there's a need to know much about the historical background. The novel itself describes the situation the characters live in, and that mostly tells you what you need to know as long as you have some general idea of colonialism and British imperialism. Sometimes I could use a lexicon, though, as there are some words obviously taken from the local language which I don't understand at all. But so far it's not been anything important to understanding what happens, so it's not a problem. Perhaps they're there more to convey the idea that the English language in India is influenced by the local culture, just like the English people staying there can't help being influenced by India.

Starting tonight! :)

Right now I'm somewhere in the middle of part two.
I love this book, even though I'm also reading rather slowly (but this seems to be my normal reading speed... like Rory I'm a slow reader ;-) ) when I stop reading and put the book down I feel like I'm missing a friend.


Katri, I could scan my glossary, that explains some of the Indian words. :-)

I know I haven't posted here in ages (so busy!) but I'm excited you guys are reading this! :-) I've been curious about it as I'm fascinated by India and I also loved A Room With a View but somehow I just have the feeling it's a very different sort of book than ARWAV. What do you guys think? Is it more of a historical/social snapshot than a character-driven novel???

I'd say it is extremely focused on characters, that is what makes it so very interesting. I have the impression that India and the situation is what keeps the characters in relation. The setting adds to the characters, but doesn't take the focus away. India itself is sometimes referred to like "she" was an acting and feeling character, too.

I have scanned the glossary and can send it to anyone who wants to have some explanations about the Indian words (it's only three pages, so it's not very much explanation anyway ;-) ). Just tell me here or send me a PM.

I just watched the 1984 movie version, and I thought it was pretty good. I recommend it to those who like the book.

The_Freddy wrote: "I'd say it is extremely focused on characters, that is what makes it so very interesting. I have the impression that India and the situation is what keeps the characters in relation. The setting ad..."

Thanks! Sounds very good :-)

I am not very far into the book but I am enjoying the different characters and situations that have come into the book. This book already screams Racism and I enjoy learning about the British rule in India. I hope that the pace picks up a little more though......

I just finished the book and the thing that struck me the most was the cultural differences between the English and the Indians that kept complicating their relationships. The one that fascinated me the most was how the Indians communicated with underlying meanings while the English were literal. Like whenever Mrs. Moore and Adela were invited to someone's house, they took it literally when the Indians meant that they WISH they could come over, but they in fact live in very poor circumstances. It makes me wonder, "How often do I listen to what people say and not what they mean?" The whole book was very thought provoking.

Right from the start of the book, I wondered why there should even be the question of 'Can the English and Indians be friends?' That's why I wanted to know a little background about the British Raj. Why would one expect them to be friends? If another country or people took over your country and people for their own profit, then how long would it take for you to like and forgive them? It seems silly to me that the oppressors should expect the oppressed to act politely towards them.

Kristi wrote: "Right from the start of the book, I wondered why there should even be the question of 'Can the English and Indians be friends?' That's why I wanted to know a little background about the British Ra..."

I feel like the questions was really "Why can't they be friends even though they try?" We get several examples of people throughout the book that genuinely try to be friends but can't because of what you said about the fact that the English had taken over their country. At the end, I felt like Forster was trying to say that India needs to be independent and that the younger generations are the ones that will overcome the racism between the two of them.

Well, Kristi, if there isn't anybody around who happens to know enough of the background to tell you more than the links I gave you, then nothing can be done. Not to mention that without more detailed questions it's hard to try to give any background - just spitting out everything one knows about the subject will probably just fill the topic with needless information one could just as easily have read on the Wikipedia.

I'm not much of an expert on the subject, but my general feeling is that the colonisation of places like India is not supposed to be a straightforward military occupation or something, but rather the idea of the English was that they take over the ruling of these backward foreign lands that the natives are running inefficiently and bring Western order, progress, religion etc. there. It's a patronizing attitude, and it's seen clearly enough in the book that the Indians are relegated to second class and aren't seen as equals or to be included in their circle by most English. But still, they're trying to coexist in that country, and to some extent cooperate, so why wouldn't it be better if they could be friends? If they could be friends, it would mean a more truly equal partnership and cooperating for the good of everybody. And at least could individual Englishmen and Indians be friends, since the individuals aren't directly responsible for the colonial relationship even if they're a part of the system.

But clearly, the inequality is making it very difficult. I'm not far enough into the book to draw in-depth conclusions, but I'm already finding it a very interesting treatise both on the difficulties of such a situation when the relationship is inequal, and on the difficulty of surpassing the gulf between two such different cultures.

I'm still not finished with Part One - I'm afraid this isn't turning out to be the best month for me to be reading this book. I think it's really good and interesting, and when I can concentrate on it I enjoy it a lot. But for various personal reasons, I'm not very good at focusing much on Forster's writing style; it requires you to think a lot to extract the meanings, and right now I'm better at receiving something where I can just be swept into emotions or drama. But I try to persist, and I hope I can do some meaningful discussion leadering even before I finish the book.

Feel free to discuss anything you want already, though! If you want to comment on something that includes spoilers, just put spoiler tags above and below it. Or if it's spoilers only up to a certain part, put something like "spoilers up to chapter XX".

I wasn't exactly asking for more information in my last post, I was just explaining why I needed more information in the first place. I knew nothing of Britain's rule of India prior to picking up this book. I understood from the summary that this question of friendship was one of the major themes of the book. I guess I'm surprised by this, since the answer seems so obvious to me. Reading the book did nothing to make me think otherwise.

Kristi: did you already finish the book? I haven't finished it yet. My impression has been that Mrs. Moore, Miss Quested, Fielding and Aziz are the exception and are seen as naive and/or odd for wanting to "bridge" the two (or more) groups. We actually see several different Indian groups with trouble relating/seeing each other as in different classes.
I see parallels between colonial India and modern US, in terms of power differential and difficulty relating, although one could say the US is further along in the process than India is in the setting of this book.
Katri: you said "...the idea of the English was that they take over the ruling of these backward foreign lands that the natives are running inefficiently and bring Western order, progress, religion etc. there. It's a patronizing attitude..." Hmmm...at the risk of raising a sensitive political issue, doesn't this sound like a certain modern war?

I don't want to argue about politics or wars, but it does make you think about how arrogant we can be towards other cultures. Everyone is egocentric about their own culture and way of life. When I sat back and thought about all the things I was learning about America in school in terms of economics and politics, I realized how arrogant we really are. It's something to think about.

Meghan wrote: "A unifying theme in Forster's work is the simple "muddle" -- a word he uses often in A Room With a View. Like he said in Howard's End, "Just connect." People too often deliberately let small social misunderstandings grow into much larger problems, affecting not just their own lives but others as well, and Forster deplored these muddles."

I was thinking about that, too.
But I had rather the impression, that either people MAKE small missunderstandings into huge things or people don't see themselves able to stop others from making a small thing theys themselves did into a huge drama or people simply don't see that what they did or said will be made into a huge problem by others.

First, sorry I haven't had time to comment lately.

Kristi, yeah, I just said that it was a bit difficult to provide information on that particular subject when I/we didn't know what specifically you wanted information on, and giving background about everything at once probably wouldn't have been all that useful. :-)

Anyway, Meghan, I agree with what you said - that the British didn't consider themselves oppressors, I think that while partly greed etc. played a large role, they also genuinely thought their influence would be beneficial to these countries, and didn't realise how much harm was caused by their patronizing attitude and lack of understanding about the local cultures, let alone other things like exploiting the resources of those nations.

I also feel that the book is more a study of why this friendship isn't possible in those circumstances than simply a question of whether or not they can be friends.

Robbie, as for your question: "at the risk of raising a sensitive political issue, doesn't this sound like a certain modern war?"

I would rather say that it sounds like people. People do this kind of thing a lot, in different cultures, in different eras, in different governmental systems and under different excuses. Neither India nor the "certain modern war" are very unique occurrences. And I wouldn't make too straight parallels between those, because while some of the underlying attitudes may be similar (I loathe politics and would rather not go into an in-depth discussion about whether or not this is so), the situations are still in many ways different. The English rule of India lasted for nearly a century and was probably planned to last much longer when it began, and on the other hand the English influence had been going on for much longer. Also, as far as I understand the influence grew primarily by economic and political means, not as much by war and military occupation. This is all quite different from a swift modern war of aggression followed by a military occupation which is meant to be short-term. But certainly the sort of attitudes and ideas which led to British and European colonialism in the 18th-20th centuries are also much present in the various international political and social problems of today's world.

Anyway, besides the political/social questions, I'm also finding the book an interesting study in how we react to foreign cultures. As a European who's spent a lot of time abroad in the recent years in very international environments, I'm finding a lot that's familiar in the attempt to understand a foreign culture, even if of course within Europe the differences are smaller than between Britain and India. In my younger self I recognise some of Adela, who on the other hand genuinely wants to try to understand a foreign culture and is not satisfied with the most superficial clichés, but on the other hand is too naive and inexperienced. I, too, took a while to realise that "nobody is India" as Forster put it.

I just finished this book and loved it. I read A Room With a View about a month ago, so I was worried this would be Forster overload. I was wrong, though. The books are clearly written by the same author, but the tones and subjects are so different.

I am finding the discussion here very interesting. I don't know a lot about British colonization of India, but I understand the idea of colonialism. I wouldn't use the word patronizing exactly. It's too weak. The occupation is more paternalistic. The Anglo-Indians in the book justify their behavior through the belief that the Indians needed to be civilized. They were doing them a service. I do see the similarities with a certain current war, but it's more than that. The war is part of the overarching, colonialist mindset that the oppressive power knows what is best for the oppressed.

One thing I loved about the book is that no one is a hero. Everyone is real and flawed. Aziz, Fielding, Mrs. Moore and Adela are all well-rounded and full of goodness and personal failings. Forster also casts doubt on all three religions discussed. I loved that no one was a shining beacon of personhood.

I was just wondering if I was alone in finding this book tedious? Everyone else seemed to love it but having failed to finish 'Howard's End' I thought I would give this a go....I think that Forster's 'muddle' that has been mentioned before is exactly what has caused my frustration...all the characters just muddle along with more questions than answer.

Brigid mentioned earlier that there is an absence of the 'perfect' character but I felt this resulted in an absence of likeability for anyone for me...

You are totally not alone! I read this with another bookclub, and we all found it to be slow-going. One thing that seemed to help was sparknotes.com

I was just going to ask more or less the same thing. To be honest, I (and this is slightly embarrassing since I was appointed the discussion leader and all) am having lots of trouble getting through it. I think it's especially that this is not the right time for me to be reading something like this, I'd need something more dramatic or more fantastical to keep my interest right now, and my brain is finding it difficult to get through the prose, though at other times I've loved Forster's style.

Related to this, I found this post just recently: The 50 best author vs. author put-downs of all time. (It's awesome and hilarious, if you can put up with someone mercilessly bashing some of your favourite authors - probably a few will be on the list, whoever they are.) Anyway, it included Katherine Mansfield saying this of Forster:

"E.M. Forster never gets any further than warming the teapot. He's a rare fine hand at that. Feel this teapot. Is it not beautifully warm? Yes, but there ain't going to be no tea."

She was speaking of Howard's End, but I feel I know what she means. Maybe at another time I'd feel differently, but now I just want my tea already, dammit. Preferably with chocolate or cookies, too.

Other thoughts? Is everyone enjoying it or are some finding it difficult to get through? Why/why not?

Well, as I alluded to above, I found myself wanting to just read the Spark Notes. Interesting things to discuss, but a bear to get through!