Theme Aziz- Fielding relationship Critical analysis
A Passage to India
(1924) is considered as E.M.Forster’s major work. Forster, major English
author of the twentieth century is a writer of great technical and intellectual
significance whose work deserves close study and analysis. Some of his major
works are The Longest Journey, A Room with a View and Howards
End.
The present novel can be
read as a valuable critique of British rule in India, a profound statement
about personal relationships and a comment upon political, ethical and
metaphysical issues. The plot structure of A Passage to India
seems to reflect the major themes that obsessed Forster when he wrote the
novel. The book is divided into three sections- MOSQUE, CAVES and TEMPLE. The
title themselves suggest meaning which is to be found behind story, people and
even setting.
At the surface level
the novel relates the story of two British ladies- Mrs. Moore and Miss Adela
Quested who want to see ‘the real India’. The bridge party at Collector
Turton’s house is not a success. This shows that there can be bridge or
communication between the British and Indians.
In the first section of
the novel Aziz and Mrs.Moore meet in the cool season. Aziz is mercurial and
temperamental whereas Mrs.Moore is kind and gentle. Both are sensitive human
beings who value affection and kindness highly and place instinct above reason,
kindness above convention. They try to form a lasting friendship where secret
understanding of the heart is predominant. An English woman and an Indian man
enter into a personal understanding that led through the novel. Aziz’s initial
suspicion is dissolved by the respect Mrs.Moore shows to the religious
atmosphere in the mosque and her acceptance to the presence of God in the
mosque. A positive affirmation of the relationship arises when Mrs.Moore says,
I don’t think I
understand people very well. I only know whether I like or dislike them.
To this Aziz replies, then
you are an Oriental.
The central episode of
A Passage to India, which is the experience of the two Englishwomen- Mrs.Moore
and Adela Quested in the Marabar Caves is symbolically and realistically the
heart of the novel. The characters who are in understanding in the first
section are drawn into the caves which represent the collapse of human
relationship in the face of chaos. The Caves symbolising hot weather defeat the
forces of reconciliation.
Mrs.Moore and Adela troubled by the monotony of their
lives accompanies Aziz to Marabar Caves. By the time they reach the caves they
are on the verge of apathy in which nothing is real. Adela is driven into near
madness as she looks into the horrifying darkness of the caves. She undergoes a
hallucination and accuses Aziz of molesting her after she hears the fearful
echo. Mrs. Moore had to undergo greater horror. The smallness and emptiness of
the cave produce an echo which is more frightening to her. Before her
experience in the cave, she had been a religious mystic who believed in God and
that his love extends towards all creatures. But now, to her, this Unity also
means total negation in which good and evil are identical. Mrs Moore reflects,
Pathos, piety, courage-
they exist, but are identical, and so is filth. Everything exists, nothing has
value.
The cave thus,
symbolise the complete triumph of forces of hostility, evil and negation.
Fielding and Aziz develop a mutual trust and genuine friendship. But the
hostility of the caves, the imprisonment of Aziz, his subsequent release and
its celebration however, put impediments on their relationship.
A reconciliation comes
about during the time of Janmashtami. Forster symbolically presents Hinduism in
its exclusive aspects. He recognises that India is a divine country which
brings spiritual joy to the participants. He also reflects on Hindu mysticism.
In the ‘Temple’, the birth of Sri Krishna is being celebrated in the town of
Mau at the time of the monsoons. The section opens with Godbole presiding over
a festival in which, amid all the noise and confusion of celebration, God is
born symbolically, and love celebrated. God, the Universal Lover, the Unknown
Friend, is at last a presence. The Hindu worshippers trying to emulate this
infinite love of Lord Krishna tries to love others equally.
They love all men, the
whole universe, and scraps of their past, tiny past splinters of detail,
emerged for a moment to melt into the universal warmth.
We learn that Aziz has come to Mau to escape
from English. Fielding along with Mrs.Moore’s children also reaches Mau. The
festival brings together these former friends into temporary reconciliation, if
not a permanent union. Still the festival builds up to a reassertion of the
possibility of personal relations, an affirmative answer to the negating echo
of the Marabar.
To carry a theme of
such weighty complexity, Forster employs a careful plot structure and an
intricate texture, both of which are proof of Forster’s unique experimentation
in the novel form. To give overall unity he uses irony, symbolism, pattern and
rhythm. The structure thus, denotes three crucial encounters. In the first an
Englishwoman and an Indian man meet in the peace of the mosque and form a
lasting friendship. In the second the bond of friendship established are
shattered by the negation of the caves. In the third, all the separations and
divisions are dissolved in a large unity, a synthesis. This pattern of thesis,
antithesis and synthesis gives what may be called an architectural unity to the
book.
E.K.Brown in his study of the Forster rightly says,
One of the reasons for
the novel’s greatness is its rhythmic form that makes us pass beyond the
character, story and setting and attend to the larger meaning, the poetic and
prophetic meaning of the novel.
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