A Passage To India

The Literary Circle, my book club, has decided to read selections this year from "The Modern Library's 100 Best Books" list.  This month's book is E. M. Forster's A Passage To India (#7).  Forster wrote this book in 1924 when the British Raj still ruled in India, but anti-British feeling was rising among the Indians.  Adela Quested is escorted out to India by Mrs. Moore whose son she may or may not marry.  Adela chafes against the tightly-knit provincial society of Chandrapore where her intended is City Magistrate.  Both Mrs. Moore and Adela express their desire to meet Indians socially and see more of the sights of the country.  She has no idea that she is asking the impossible because of the divisions between races, religions, education, politics and the sexes, but she persists.  Her meeting with Dr. Aziz at the home of Cyril Fielding, head of the Government College, results in an outing to the inconviently situated Marabar Caves.  The incident upon which the novel turns takes place here at the Caves.  Mrs. Moore has a bad experience in the first cave, and urges Adela and Aziz to explore the rest of the caves on their own with a guide.  Adela upsets Aziz with a personal question and he goes off to another cave to avoid her for a bit.  Later, when he looks for her, he sees Adela in the distance getting into a car with another woman and driving away.  He returns to Mrs. Moore to find that Fielding has just arrived.  He is upset that his guest has left without a word.  Upon their return to Chandrapore, Dr. Aziz is arrested and put on trial for an attempted assault on Miss Quested.  Aziz and Fielding both want to know who is responsible for charging Dr. Aziz. Why, Miss Quested!  Mrs. Moore and Mr. Fielding both believe in Dr. Aziz's innocence and are ostracized from the British community for their support.  Mrs. Moore is bundled off back to England so she can't interfere in the trial.  The strongest anti-British advocate volunteers to defend Aziz during the trial.  The community in the meantime is torn apart by the whole episode, and visions of the Mutiny of 1857 invoked by the British as things get uglier and uglier.  On the witness stand, Adela recants her sworn deposition to the consternation of the Anglo-Indian citizens and in turn, is ostracized herself.  Mr. Fielding provides a place for her to stay until she can return to England when things die down. 

The real question is: what happened to Adela in the Caves?  Was she assaulted or not?  I read somewhere that even E.M. Forster himself didn't know the answer to that one.  It was a device on which to hang the plot, and to express his views.

I did watch David Lean's 1984 film version of A Passage To India to see how it compared to the book.  It was a pretty accurate adaption of the book, and visually beautiful, except for changing Cyril Fielding's first name to Richard, and moving the final section of the book from Mau to Srinigar (which of course had stunning cinematographic possibilities).  There was also the inexplicable casting of Alec Guiness as Professor Godbole, a Hindu professor, and a really annoying (and dated!) film score that made me think of Ryan's Daughter and not at all of India.  Small quibles, really.  The reason I don't generally like film adaptations of books I've read is that I've created the characters in my head - they look a certain way, they sound a certain way - and I'm always disappointed when I see them on screen.  Also for a book like A Passage To India, so much of the meat of the book exists in the interior life of the characters and the influences of time, place and culture.  You can skim off the action and come somewhat near, but you never capture the heart of the book.  I felt that way about James Clavell's Shogun.  I think that was one of the best novels I've ever read.  I was convinced by the time I finished it that I could think in Japanese.  That, of course, is a fantasy, but it does show how powerful an effect the immersion in Japanese culture had for me.  Richard Chamberlin sure looked great in the miniseries adaption, but I felt that they had gutted the novel by removing all the political and cultural aspects that made this book so interesting.

Anyway, my overall impression is that A Passage To India is not a quick read, but a worthwhile way to spend some time.