"All vistas close in the unseen" : a study of the transcendent in the fiction of E. M. Forster

Abstract

From introduction: It has become something of a commonplace among critics to remark Forster's relative lack of success in offering an alternative to the world which he satirises with such wit and humour. His comic treatment of the suburban absurdities of the Edwardian Englishman is, on the whole, far more compelling and memorable than the often vague, symbolic gestures by means of which he implies the possibility of something better. With the exception of his last and greatest novel, A Passage to India, his "alternatives" are largely factitious and contrived. Worse, the reader senses a fundamental uncertainty on the part of the author: his characteristic ambivalence in itself an indication of a perceptive and discriminating mind -- all too often suggests lack of conviction rather than an intelligent awareness of the infinitude of human possibilities.