A Passage to India
by E. M. Forster · first published 1924
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When Adela Quested and her elderly companion Mrs Moore arrive in the Indian town of Chandrapore, they quickly feel trapped by its insular and prejudiced 'Anglo-Indian' community. Determined to escape the parochial English enclave and explore the 'real India', they seek the guidance of the charming and mercurial Dr Aziz, a cultivated Indian Muslim. But a mysterious incident occurs while they are exploring the Marabar caves with Aziz, and the well-respected doctor soon finds himself at the centre of a scandal that rouses violent passions among both the British and their Indian subjects. A master
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So for my unofficial book club with a good friend, we're in the final act of A Passage to India by E.M. Forster, after having finished A Room with a View a few weeks before. I enjoy 19th and early 20th century literature for the prose quality quite a lot, and Forster does not disappoint on that…
on “Ask HN: What are you reading?” ↗For anyone to whom the name E.M.Forster does not ring a bell, he's more well known for "A Room with a View" and "A Passage to India".[1] He also wrote another short story which I consider to be even better than The Machine Stops. It's called The Other Side of the Hedge[2], and while it's not as prescient it's one of my favorite…
on “The Machine Stops (1909) [pdf]” ↗"The rise of communications as a means of linking people together was completely missed" Not by everyone. Take a look at "The Machine Stops" by E.M.Forster (of "A Room with a View" and "A Passage to India" fame).[1][2] In 1909 he predicted something like the internet, chatrooms, internet addiction, and various other things that have since happened. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_Stops…
on “Asking the wrong questions” ↗…philanthropic terms. A favorite quote of mine is George Orwell quoting E. M. Forster "Again, he [Gandhi] seems to have been quite free from that maniacal suspiciousness which, as E. M. Forster rightly says in A Passage to India, is the besetting Indian vice, as hypocrisy is the British vice." [1] [1] https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...
on “Scandinavian 'Nabob' of the British Empire: Discovery of a New Colonial Archive” ↗For anyone to whom the name E.M.Forster does not ring a bell,[1] he's more well known for "A Room with a View" and "A Passage to India". [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._M._Forster
on “The Machine Stops by E.M. Forster (1909)” ↗Also check out "The Machine Stops"[1] by E. M. Forster (more famous for writing "A Passage to India" and "A Room With a View"). Written in 1909, it foreshadowed the internet, VR, instantaneous global communication, chat rooms, internet addiction, and other things we take for granted now but were incredibly…
on “Reality vs. Kurzweil’s expectations” ↗There's a nice bit in Forster's A Passage to India in which one of the Indian characters reflects on how ill-mannered another character is for taking a polite excuse (which also happens to be a lie) as a problem to solve and not as the firm "no" that…
on “Aizuchi: Does your listening make Japanese people uncomfortable? (2013)” ↗The opening chapters of A Passage to India include an Indian man thinking about how irritating it is that these uncultured Brits don’t understand a polite lie as a refusal, and always want to try to solve the “problem” to get around the refusal.…
on “Are you stuck in movie logic?” ↗