Mrs Moore
Mrs Moore
Mrs Moore is the most enigmatic of all the characters in A Passage to India. An elderly Englishwoman, she, like Aziz, has her precursors in Forster’s work, most particularly in Mrs Wilcox of Howards End (1910). We see Mrs Moore at her best in the scene in the mosque with Aziz. There she is considerate and sympathetic, light-hearted and completely frank. Despite his initial roughness, she treats Aziz with easy friendship and as an equal. Her understanding and tolerance are apparent in her acceptance of God’s presence in the mosque. The words ‘God is here’ are a significant indication of her spirituality; when, later, she argues with Ronny about the duties of the English in India she returns to the subject of God’s omnipresence, emphasising her belief that God’s will is that man shall love his neighbour. Her visit to India brings about a crisis in Mrs Moore’s spiritual life. Ronny believes that her religious bouts are always a sign of ill-health; certainly she is tired and dispirited for most of the, time and we do not often see the side of her character which so endears her to Aziz. Her second meeting with Aziz at Fielding’s tea party is the last time we see her in a carefree mood. Her problems begin at that party: first, Adela indiscreetly tells Aziz that she does not intend to settle in India; this remark indicates to Mrs Moore that her mission has resulted in failure and Fielding observes that she ‘looked flustered and put out’; secondly, Ronny rudely breaks up the party and she realises that the English have no intention of being pleasant to the Indians, whether God is watching them or not; and thirdly, Professor Godbole’s song suggests the possibility of the absence of God, that He is perhaps not, after all, omnipresent: ‘I say to Him, Come, come, come, come, come, come. He neglects to come’. The song with its negative conclusion is followed by an almost mystic moment of silence: “Ronny’s steps had died away, and there was a moment of
Mrs Moore is the most enigmatic of all the characters in A Passage to India. An elderly Englishwoman, she, like Aziz, has her precursors in Forster’s work, most particularly in Mrs Wilcox of Howards End (1910). We see Mrs Moore at her best in the scene in the mosque with Aziz. There she is considerate and sympathetic, light-hearted and completely frank. Despite his initial roughness, she treats Aziz with easy friendship and as an equal. Her understanding and tolerance are apparent in her acceptance of God’s presence in the mosque. The words ‘God is here’ are a significant indication of her spirituality; when, later, she argues with Ronny about the duties of the English in India she returns to the subject of God’s omnipresence, emphasising her belief that God’s will is that man shall love his neighbour. Her visit to India brings about a crisis in Mrs Moore’s spiritual life. Ronny believes that her religious bouts are always a sign of ill-health; certainly she is tired and dispirited for most of the, time and we do not often see the side of her character which so endears her to Aziz. Her second meeting with Aziz at Fielding’s tea party is the last time we see her in a carefree mood. Her problems begin at that party: first, Adela indiscreetly tells Aziz that she does not intend to settle in India; this remark indicates to Mrs Moore that her mission has resulted in failure and Fielding observes that she ‘looked flustered and put out’; secondly, Ronny rudely breaks up the party and she realises that the English have no intention of being pleasant to the Indians, whether God is watching them or not; and thirdly, Professor Godbole’s song suggests the possibility of the absence of God, that He is perhaps not, after all, omnipresent: ‘I say to Him, Come, come, come, come, come, come. He neglects to come’. The song with its negative conclusion is followed by an almost mystic moment of silence: “Ronny’s steps had died away, and there was a moment of
References: to it again wander through the novel, are lost, picked up and dropped again. The very last mention of her in the book; however, is Aziz’s’. . . the name that is very sacred in my mind, namely Mrs Moore’. The Gokul Ashtami festival in Part III is given wider significance by being repeatedly referred to in biblical terms so that, whilst it retains its Hindu origin, it is also placed in a Christian context. The birth of Krishna is at one and the same time the birth of Christ; Gokul is Bethlehem, King Kansa is Herod and Krishna’s salvation that of Christ. Echoes of biblical stories tantalise the reader with doubts and memories: ‘God so loved the world that he…’ gave His only begotten Son (St John 3.16)? — No — ‘. . . that he took monkey’s flesh upon him’. There are references to the ‘Ark of the Lord’ (see, for example, I Kings 2.26), to the ‘Despised and Rejected’ (see Isaiah 53.3);sorrow is annihilated (see Isaiah 35.10); the freeing of prisoners takes place. The hope brought to men by the Birth ceremony is thus for all men and, together with the abundant rains, it contains a promise for the future, again opening the novel on? expanding it rather than seeking completion. Forster uses quite a number of specialised Anglo-Indian, Hindi or Arabic words in the novel. In many cases their meaning is self-evident or apparent from the context. The Penguin Modern Classics edition, however, contains a useful glossary of such words and should solve any difficulties. In general, Forster’s Indian characters speak excellent standard English Aziz’s grasp of idiom impresses Fielding in Chapter 7, though in Chapter 2 he twice uses the un-idiomatic ‘in the same box’ to Mrs Moore. When they talk among themselves Aziz and his friends would probably, in fact, speak Arabic but Forster has not fallen into the trap of translating this into a kind of ‘pidgin English’ to indicate that it is not their native language. Only Mohammed Latif speaks the English of the stake-Indian, such as ‘You spick a lie’ (Chapter 13) when Aziz teases him and this is at least partly because he is considered to be the comic turn of the Marabar expedition. Aziz himself speaks of his ‘imperfect English’ but his imperfections are hardly noticeable to the reader.