Where Angels Fear to Tread

by E.M. Forster
this edition Buccaneer Books, 1976
184 pages

E.M. Forster continues to intrigue me. When the film Howard's End came out a looong time ago, I fell in love with it. I watched it over and over because I thought there was some deep meaning to it that I just couldn't understand. I was determined to "get it," so I read the book. While I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book, I still didn't feel that I "got it" until I finally did some research on it. I learned that Forster wrote the novel in response to an article he had read which asked, "Who shall inherit Britain?" Basically, during Forster's lifetime the economic balance in Britain, which had been so delicately maintained for centuries, was in peril. Who would inherit Britain: the upper class who had ruled for generations, or the lower class who were rising in number and buying power? If you pay attention to how Howard's End ends, you'll see what Forster thought the answer was (hint: who lives at Howard's End at the end?).

All this is really a long introduction to how I got involved with E.M. Forster. I also read A Room With a View after loving the film; while I didn't like that novel as much as Howard's End, I did like it enough to give Forster one more try. So, while browsing for a book at the library two weeks ago, I ended up with Where Angels Fear to Tread, and, after reading it, here is where I stand on Forster now: while his novels (in my opinion) have really deep sociological meaning, they are also incredibly lyrical and reader-friendly. He may use the long Henry James sentence here and there, but he relies more on dialogue and short meaningful sentences to set a strong tone of romance and human wishy-washiness that really appeals to me. I've noticed that his characters will often say one thing and then do something else, and while that is partly a satire on the encrusted manners of English upper-class, I also find it to be a pretty fair representation of the way we all function in life. Hasn't your husband ever said, "I'll do the dishes tonight," and then fallen asleep on the couch during the Lakers game without even turning the water on? Mine has. Haven't you ever said, "I'm going to stop eating french fries because they always give me a stomach-ache" and then ordered them for dinner on Thursday night? I have. Well, so do Forster's characters.

Where Angels Fear to Tread has a very original plot: a wealthy English widow is sent to Italy by her prudish disapproving in-laws who want to get her out of the way so that they can raise her daughter "properly." She falls in love with a poor young Italian and marries him largely to spite her in-laws, but it is not a happy marriage and she dies in childbirth. Ultimately, the in-laws try to intervene and take the child born of the marriage to raise him "properly" with his half-sister, but tragedy ensues. And yet, the novel does not end tragically. In true Forster style, the ending left me thinking, "What? I don't get it. What does he mean by all this?" So I had to look at the title, and I think partly the theme is about romance. Not just love, but that Latin romance about passion and the emotions. The uptight English suppose themselves to be angels of mercy to their granddaughter/niece and then the half-Italian baby, but they fear to tread on the Latin passions at play in Italy. Those who do give into the passions just get their lives ruined. I also thought, though, that there was a theme about the nature of the parent-child relationship. Every person in the novel has a sticky, troublesome relationship with either their parent or their child. All of the trauma is brought about by either domineering parents or rebellious children. So I also think that that precious parent-child relationship is one that angels themselves would not tamper with, even though it can be so evidently flawed. When the wealthy English family does try to tamper with the parent-child relationship, it leads to the tragedy of the novel.

After reading this, I've decided that I want to finish reading all of Forster's novels. I love that his novels are so readable and have good literary aesthetics, but they are also deep and leave me thinking about the meaning when I have finished reading. I'm not going to just read them all right away, but I definitely have a mind to work him in whenever I am looking for something to read. It shouldn't be hard - it looks like there are only three other novels: A Passage to India, The Longest Journey, and Maurice.

Cranford

by Elizabeth Gaskell
this edition: Penguin Books 2008
187 pages

If you loved the Masterpiece Theater presentation of Cranford on PBS, you will love this book. While the miniseries was drawn from several of Gaskell's books, many of the main characters play a role in the novel Cranford, as you can see in the lovely picture of Miss Mattie Jenkyns on the cover.

Cranford is not a plot-based novel; in fact, there is not much of a plot at all. It is more a collection of observations of the women of Cranford with some delightful "vignettes" (okay, I'm borrowing that word from the cover) to tie them all together. The narrator is Mary Smith, but we don't learn much about her except that she has her "own individual small econom[y]." She writes, "I am not above owning that I have this human weakness myself. String is my foible. My pockets get full of little hanks of it, picked up and twisted together, ready for uses that never come. I am seriously annoyed if anyone cuts the string of a parcel, instead of patiently and faithfully undoing it fold by fold." Well, as I said, we don't learn much more about Mary because she focuses her writing on capturing glimpses of the idosyncratic female residents of Cranford.

I could probably write a two- or three-page list of funny lines from the book, but I think what I'd like to do instead is extol Miss Mattie Jenkyns. I am so pleased that she graces the cover of the novel, because by the end of the novel we realize that Miss Mattie is truly the star, the sweet honey that holds the story together. I am trying not to be too biased because Dame Judi Dench (whom I adore - have you seen her in "As Time Goes By"? beautiful lady!) portrays her in the miniseries. But I do think she was wonderfully cast, and the Judi Dench is appropriately concealed in the layers of fabric, ribbons and bows to sweetly portray little Miss Mattie. I was so heartbroken that Miss Mattie did not ever have the chance to marry her true love. She would have made such a selfless and kind wife and mother. She is so thoughtful, considerate, circumspect and humble that I cannot imagine any egocentric fool not acknowledging her pristine spirit. All this and the novel is not too saccharine-sweet because Gaskell fills it with such good warm humor and a little bit of tragedy. It is just a perfect balance that makes it a delight to read. One other bonus: it's not very long, and it reads quickly, so if you need a good pick-me-up read, I would strongly recommend this one!

I also wanted to say that in previous posts I have complained about the impressionist approach to portraying characters. In truth, this novel is a bit impressionistic because it is narrated in first person by a narrator who could not possibly give us all the deep dark psychological explorations of characters that is the hallmark of Victorian literature I love. Well, I hope I am not biased towards this novel simply because it is Victorian, but I actually really enjoyed the impressionist approach here and felt that I did have great insight into the makeup of the several characters portrayed. As I said, it's a little bit of a light read, not your typical heavy and dark Victorian novel, but I found it utterly refreshing and enjoyable.