An Endless Passage Of The Soul: A Cultural Interpretation Of E.M. Forster's Novels

Edward Morgan Forster( 1879-1970), one of twentieth century English novelists, has ranked among the greatest novelists. Starting from his social conscience and sober mind, Forster, in his novels, originated the criticism on the "underdeveloped heart" of the English people in his novels prior to his predecessors. Further more, Forster is desirous to change the "logic", and expects a kind of "connection". He wishes that, through the "connection" in different contexts, warmth, intelligence and soul could be infused into the alienated world and the indifferent stubborn hearts could be saved.Stemmed in the anfractuous reality and the depth of philosophy, his novels show his greatest honesty and responsibility. This paper is an overall study on Forster's six novels, especially on Howards End and A Passage to India. Actually, this paper is a kind of cultural study on Forster's criticism on the "underdeveloped heart" of the English people, his trying to "connect" and the failure of such a "connection". The perspectives of intertextuality, comparative philosophy, ethnology, and psychology are adopted to trace the development and transformation of Forster's thought in his novels and to explore his opinion of "connection" and his diploid cultural identification. According to the study above, Forster's opinion of "connection" appears non-political and Utopian, but it actually reflects his England-centered or Europe-centered standpoint.