In a Passage to India the author, E. M Forster sends the message of India’s mistreatment and misrepresentation by Britain. Throughout the novel, the reader is able to observe how British and Indian characters are treated differently. The author demonstrates the British perspective of Indians being the ignorant characters in the novel, whose company leads to troubles. Another aspect of the British perspective is that Indians are being treated as inferiors to the British in their own country, because if it were not for the British, the social and political order in India will descend into chaos. The author demonstration of the British perspective encourages the reader to feel sympathetic towards Indians. Whenever Aziz and Ronny meet, Ronny seems to use a tone of arrogance and disrespect towards Indians. Also, in the conversation between MR. Turton, Adela, and Mrs. Moore about the natives, the tone of arrogance seems to be present, as well. The author indicates his favoritism towards Indians by representing them as the weak and helpless characters in the novel. The reader first encounters the mistreatment of the British towards Indians in the scene of the bridge party, where Mrs. Moore sees the Indian ladies. To Mrs. Moore’s question “Do kindly tell us who these ladies are” (pg.42), Mr. Turton’s responses “you are superior to them, anyways. Don’t forget that. You are superior to everyone in India…” (pg.42). Mr. Turton’s response to Mrs. Moore’s question gives a clear indication of what British colonialists think of Indians, and the way they should be treated. This situation makes the reader wonders, why would the British colonialists treat a group of Indians that they do not know in such a disrespectful manner? Forster prov... ... middle of paper ... ...y the author strikes a feeling of relieve inside the reader to finally see that justice is being enforced, that Indians are being equated to the British. Although the author presents the English prejudice in the novel in many situations, he also presents the Indian reaction and behavior. The author demonstration of British behavior vs. Indian behavior gives the readers the field of free thinking and association to decide for themselves which side they would favor. It also questions the validity of criticisms that think of this book as a bias novel that offends British people. However, the author does indicate his favoritism towards Indians throughout the novel by presenting them as the weak and helpless characters that do not have any authority in their own country, but they poses scientific and spiritual knowledge that earns them respect among their society.
Throughout the story there is a constant comparison of White culture and Indian culture. It begins with the narrator noticing a difference in landscaping between the two cultures. ." . . there is always beauty
One statement in the beginning of the book was especially poignant to any one who studies Indian culture, It is easy for us to feel a vicarious rage, a misery on behalf of these people, but Indians, dead and alive would only receive such feelings with pity or contempt; it is too easy to feel sympathy for a people who culture was wrecked..
The first perception discussed in the essay compares the way the Indians run their form of government to that of the English. He notes how the Indian are able to run a government without police, prisons, or punishment, and instead it is run on a sort of basis of respect with “great order and decency” (Norton, 477). When someone speaks in the Indian counsel everyone listens and remains silent, and once the speaker is finished the rest remain silent to allow time for th...
The authors uses the strategy of symbolism to show how the Indians are struggling and are being restricted. The text states, “my Motherland! - fear, the phantom demon, shaped by your own distorted dreams… burden of ages, bending your head, breaking your back, blinding your eyes to the beckoning call of the future...shackles of slumber...mistrusting the star that speaks of truth’s adventurous path… anarchy of destiny… Sails are weakly yielded to blind uncertain winds… hand….rigid and cold as Death… The insult of dwelling in a puppet’s world… movements are started through brainless wires….repeated… mindless habits… Figures wait with patient obedience for a master of show to be stirred into… Life” These quotes show imagery to develop meaning in word choice. He uses the words ‘Motherland’ to represent India and the ‘phantom demon’ being Great Britain. The Indian people are afraid of the controller that watches them. India tries its best to get out of the clutches of Britain. But the country keeps on getting pulled back in and all the people can do is to have hope for a future in which they can be free. Thus, the rights of Indians were
“The contact of two races so dissimlar in character, in culture, and institutions, as the English and the Indian, raises the problem of the contact of cultures in its most acute forms” (Spear, 22). The problem in India was complicated by numerous factors. The strangeness of the environment, the differences in the national character of the two groups and the differences in the social and political institutions, were the few that played an im...
The novel from the very beginning seems to be overshadowed by the pre-conceived notions about India and the
'Colonial literature,' Abdul JanMohammed writes, 'is an exploration and a representation of a world at the boundaries of "civilisation," a world that has not (yet) been domesticated by European signification or codified in detail by its ideology. That world is therefore perceived as uncontrollable, chaotic, unattainable and ultimately evil' (18). In the wake of the Indian Mutiny of 1857, Dickens' fictional response to that event, "The Perils of Certain English Prisoners," reflected both a culture of desired vengeance against the mutineers, and Dickens' sympathy with that viewpoint. This stance entailed a rejection of the then Governor of India Lord Canning's call for an initial period of discipline, followed by 'discrimination' to be shown toward the mutineers in the form of clemency (Oddie 3), and of Disraeli who 'spoke with considerable sympathy of the Mutiny as a justifiable Indian protest against British harshness' (Hutchins 80). Joining the vitriolic criticism of this viewpoint expressed by The Timesand the majority of the public, Dickens dismissed the governing forces in India for procrastinating and failing to protect British subjects in India (Oddie 4). The Mutiny was a direct threat to Victorian values transposed to India, embodied in the aforementioned British subjects: consider the 'almost universal demand for bloody revenge on the mutineers'(Oddie 3), for their reported brutality toward British women and children, which 'was the most direct outrage imaginable against the whole Victorian concept of women as pure and violable, the source of the sanctity of hearth and home' (Oddie 6).
Recent years have witnessed a large number of Indian English fiction writers who have stunned the literary world with their works. The topics dealt with are contemporary and populist and the English is functional, communicative and unpretentious. Novels have always served as a guide, a beacon in a conflicting, chaotic world and continue to do so. A careful study of Indian English fiction writers show that there are two kinds of writers who contribute to the genre of novels: The first group of writers include those who are global Indians, the diasporic writers, who are Indians by birth but have lived abroad, so they see Indian problems and reality objectively. The second group of writers are those born and brought up in India, exposed to the attitudes, morale and values of the society. Hence their works focus on the various social problems of India like the plight of women, unemployment, poverty, class discrimination, social dogmas, rigid religious norms, inter caste marriages, breakdown of relationships etc.
In this way, Salman Rushdie presents the derogatory picture of India throughout the novel preferring the superiority of what is European and inferiority of what is not. By presenting the orientalist perception of India, Rushdie attempts to attract the western readership. In spite of the fact that he himself is an Indian, he could not avoid the attraction of western readership. For this reason, sometimes, his position becomes ambivalent.
The measured dialogue between Reader and Editor serves as the framework through which Gandhi seeks to discredit accepted terms of civilization and denounce the English. These principle characters amply assist in the development o...
Yes, I agree with EM Forster that A Passage to India is not a political novel. Instead, it explores the vastness of infinity and seems (at first) to portray nothing. In those two words alone, `infinity', and `nothing', is the allusion of wondering, and wandering spirits. The title, A Passage to India, evokes a sense of journey and destination. When we string these two ideas together the novel begins to reveal itself as a garland worn in humble tribute to India. With this garland around his neck, Forster also pays homage to the Shri Krishna consciuousness as expressed through the Hindu religion. The clumsy attempts of the two great religions of Christianity and Islam to understand India represent forster's own efforts, and the journey he makes to India is tracked throughout the novel.
The early years of the twentieth century saw the rise of the novel as a popular genre in the literature of the war-struck Edwardian England. Novelists like Joseph Conrad, E.M.Forster, Virginia Woolf, James Joyce and D.H. Lawrence gave the form new dimensions. Among these writers E.M. Forster made a mark in the literature of his age through his last novel A Passage to India (1924), which was entirely different from Forster's other novels in that it dealt with the political occupation of India by the British, a colonial domination that ended soon after the publication of this novel. Forster, a liberal and humanist in outlook, emphasised the importance of love and understanding at the personal level in this novel.
In sum, through their dichotomies of the British and Indian relationship during the emergence of India to independence, Forster and Scott allow the reader to free themselves of their prejudices and open up to their views on historical culture. Forster ‘attaches to India through extravagant metaphorical meanings and anthropomorphisms’ whilst Orwell stated that he ‘didn’t do prophecy’ and that he would not ‘put anything into it that human societies have not already done.’
Because there are many points of view and not all of them are explained, therefore, modernist novels often tend to have narrative perspectives that suddenly shift or cause confusion. This is because modernism has always been an experimental form of literature that lacks a traditional narrative or a set, rigid structure. Therefore, E. M. Forster, author of A Passage to India, uses such techniques to portray the true nature of reality. The conflict between Adela, a young British girl, and Aziz, an Indian doctor, at the Marabar Caves is one that implements multiple modernist ideals and is placed in British-India. In this novel, Forster shows the relations and tension between the British and the Indians through a series of events that were all caused by the confusing effects of modernism.
A Passage to India by Edward Morgan Forster is truly one of the great books of it’s time. Written in an era when the world was more romantic, yet substantially less civil to the unwestern world than it is today; E. M. Forster opened the eyes of his fellow countrymen and the world by showing them the truth about British Colonialism. The novel aids greatly in the ability to interpret events of the time as well as understand the differences between the social discourse of then and now.