“Why Can’t We Be Friends Now?’ How Far Would You Agree That This Question of Friendship Between the English and Indians Is Central to the Novel?”  

Forster’s novel, A Passage to India is based primarily on the root friendship between the English and Indians, Forster the omniscient narrator gives us his point of view of how he experienced India to be a disheartening place at the time filled with stereotyping. I believe he wrote this novel because he was also disheartened by his own kind and their inability to connect and understand the prejudice of the Indians. This novel is very contrasting as Forster’s Eurocentric view of India differs much from the British at the time, as the English abandoned their religion, faith, and were poisoned with vulgarness and arrogance as they treated Indians like nothing but scums beneath them, as they addressed them “pukka”.This is ironic because they’re level of immaturity shows how truly uneducated and the British were, they felt very much above the Indians, so instead they overlooked themselves and turned they’re backs on the Indians, from this moment both races developed hatred, anger and resentment towards each other. However, the British and Indian are far too different from one another.

This theme of friendship that Forster presents is interesting. Because as he describes India to be a highly spiritual place, the bound force of the universe seems to not allow the races to comply with each other. It seems that the ideology of the British and Indians do not cross and as the British try to change the ways in India a lot of economic injustice occurs. Mrs.Moore and Adela, foreign to India, were devastated at their arrival by the marxism and comedy of manners in India. They were shocked with the behavior of the British towards the Indians, the level of arrogance from the British shocked them. They quickly felt responsible and wanted to make immends with the Indians. As far as Mrs. Moore and Adela reached this barrier of friendship they wanted with the Indians the universe kept trying to pull them back, evil strikes from within the caves Adela enters and breaks the barrier