An Elegy Of Otherness—a Postcolonial Study Of A Passage To India

E. M. Forster is acknowledged as one of the most well-known novelists in the twentieth century. A Passage to India, is one of Forster’s representative works, the best-known and most widely read novel, one of E. M. Forster’s representative works to be studied as colonialist narrative. With the publication of this novel, Forster approached his prime, and his artistic talent was recognized by the literal circle. The insightful exploration of the relationship between Britain and India guarantees its classic position of British colonist literature. Upon its publication, it drew great attention upon Indian politics and culture and has become a focus of critical concern. Critics approach the novel with particular interests from their own points of view. Particularly, since the uprising of postcolonial criticism, the racism, cultural imperialism, national culture and cultural identity increasingly become the focus of literary circles and the image of the Other of the India is abundant and deliberately portrayed. More and more scholars believe that the image of Other in A Passage to India is essentially multiple and open, with rich connotations.This thesis aims to study how Forster views the Indian culture by interpreting the textual features of the Other. By discussion of the Other discourse of the natural and cultural landscape, religious belief, the image of Indians and the implicit gender discourse in the Indian image, this thesis analyzes the function of discourse, illustrating that Other is the subjective product of Forster’s contradictory attitude and colonial consciousness. He applied the construction of Other to achieve the establishment of self-identity of western culture. Finally, the cultural relationship, cultural context and subtle attitude of the writer can be revealed.In the last part, this thesis draws a conclusion that as a member of British Empire, Forster can not go beyond his class limitations and analyzes the basic reasons for the conflict and confrontation between Britain and India. Therefore, the discourse of Other became the recognition of the Self, namely the west.