Is Maurice a hopelessly flawed text, or a thoughtful adaptation of the novel form to the subject matter and a strong intervention in debates of the time?

Preet L.

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Is "Maurice" a hopelessly flawed text, or a thoughtful adaptation of the novel form to the subject matter and a strong intervention in debates of the time?

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Abstract

E.M Forster dedicated his novel "Maurice" to a "happier year", affirming his intention of the novel's purpose as an insight into the future evolution of sexual desire and relationships, leading some to attach significance to the text as a protagonist of controversial debate of the time . Forster delayed publication of Maurice for 57 years waiting for a time where wider concepts of desire could be explored without recrimination . Indeed, it has been argued that the novel was self-prophetic in predicting experiences Forster had not had himself, who later described his own sex life within the framework that Maurice had provided. Forster's autobiographical parallels with Maurice has fuelled debate as to whether the novel was significant as "a strong intervention in debates of the time" or alternatively a "hopelessly flawed" text.

Introduction.
Forster's self proclaimed significance of the novel as a symbol of the future.
The depiction of a homosexual future as a return from an idealistic past.
The problem of literary history in Forster's aspects of the novel.
Maurice's subversion of the traditional sequence.
The pre-existing societal models of family and its dictates for Maurice.
Maurice and Scudder's meeting in London.
Conclusion.

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[...] This is further evidenced when Clive and Maurice have long day in the light and in the wind”[79] and they break school rules and are describe as being “beyond humanity, and death, had it come, would only have continued their pursuit of a retreating horizon[80].” This statement is central to Maurice's development in the novel and the reference to death highlights the tension between the “boy's certainty of going on and the narrator's refusal to believe that time works that way[81]”. [...]

[...] Narrative Inversion: The textual construction of homosexuality in E.M Forster's Novels. Styles 26 310-26. Matz (2001) op.cit. Nelson Scott (1992) op.cit. Matz (2001) op.cit. Sigmund Freud. Fetishism: On Sexuality: Three Essays on the theory of Sexuality and other works. Pp345-357. Ibid. Matz (2001) op.cit. Nelson Scott op.cit. New York Harcourt Brace and World 1927. Ibid at 42. Robert Martin, op cit. Lanser, Susan, op.cit. (1927) op.cit. Ibid. Ibid. John Fletcher, op.cit. (1927) op cit. at page 49. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. [...]

[...] Styles 26 310-26. Bakshi, Parminder., (1996). Distant Desire: Homoerotic Codes and the Subversion of the English Novel in E.M Forser's Fiction. New York: Peter Lang. Ibid. Howard J Booth (2007). “Maurice, The Cambridge Companion to E. M Forster ed David Bradshaw. Cambridge University Press. Robert k Martin, (1983). “Edward Carpenter and the Double structure of Maurice”. Journal of Homosexuality 8:3-4 E.M Forster. “Maurice” at p.254. Joseph Bristow (1995). Effeminate England: Homoerotic Writing After 1885. [7]E.M Forster op.cit at p.250. Fletcher, John. (1992). [...]

[...] Indeed Forster himself would appear to acknowledge this intrinsic flaw within the narrative of Maurice when he observes that is always possible for you or me in daily life to deny that time exists and to act accordingly even if we are sent by our fellow citizens to what they choose to call a lunatic asylum. But it is never possible for the novelist to defy time inside the fabric of his novel[45]”. Accordingly, it would appear that the very in Maurice are justified on the value of fighting time and Forster comments that life in time is obviously base and inferior” and he demands “cannot the novelist abolish it from his work, even as the mystic asserts he has abolished it from his experience, and install its radiant alternative alone[46]?” Whilst the rationale behind the break with narrative convention and defiance of time is central to the theme of homosexual identity in Maurice, it contradicts Forster's own claim that the central purpose of a novel is to deliver a story. [...]

[...] Forster's Self-Erasure: Maurice and the Scene of Masculine Love. Sexual Sameness: Textual Differences in Lesbian and Gay Writing. Ed, Joseph Bristow, New York: Routledge 64-90. Jesse Matz (2001). Literary Impressionism and Modernist Aesthetics. Cambridge University Press. Ibid. Paul Ricouer. (1984). Time and Narrative. Trans Kathleen McLaughlin and David Pellauer 3 Vols. University of Chicago Press. Jesse Matz (2001) op.cit. Robert K Martin (1983) op.cit. E.M Forster op.cit at 249. Fletcher (1992) op.cit. Jesse Matz (2001) op.cit. Colmer, John (1971) Comradeship and Ecstasy. [...]

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