Nine of us gathered to talk about the
classic for 2018 – Howard’s End by
the English writer E. M. Forster. This book was televised in 2017 and has been
in print since its first publication in 1910.
The story concerns a family of siblings,
Margaret and Helen and brother Tibby, whose parents are deceased but the
children are fortunate to have independent means. They live in London. The
novel revolves around their relationships with a rich family, the Wilcoxes and
a young poor man, Leonard Bast. It is
the Schlegel’s connectedness with various strata of middle class society that
interests the author. The main characters treat the young man with varying
degrees of care and acceptance. They treat the rich family as inferiors in
intellect but learn over time to accept them as they are and Margaret, the
eldest sibling eventually marries the widowed Henry Wilcox and lives with him
and her younger sister, Helen at Howard’s end. It is not a usual romance but
comments on Edwardian society. There is a lot more going on than just the story
of the romance.
The general opinion from our group was of
enjoyment but with reservations for some readers. One felt it was quite stodgy.
One member felt it was like looking at the society from the top. Another reader
was disappointed that she had watched the TV serial first before reading it as
that influenced her images of the settings and the characters. Some members
believed that their expectations were so high that the relationships didn’t
seem convincing. This was particularly the relationship of Margaret to Henry
Wilcox. What did she see in him ?
The discussion mainly revolved around two
main subjects – the involvement of the period in the text and similarities with
other novels.
The Edwardian
period
Forster is truly insightful in regard to
class in England pre World War 1 and how regimented it was even in the halcyon
days of the Edwardian period. For
instance, the very formal (somewhat tortured ) relationship between Mr Bast and
Helen and Margaret. He just wants a bit of romance in his life -- to think
about books and to take his mind off the daily grind of work while they keep
wanting to talk to him about the practical realities of his life. They don’t have to experience mundane work as
they are wealthy women. There is an inherent conflict between the parties from
the moment Helen absentmindedly picks up his umbrella at a concert. It starts
the fractured relationship. Strangely the relationship with the Wilcoxes also
gets off to a rocky start with Helen again starting it by visiting this family
and doing the wrong thing by falling in love very suddenly with the young son.
All too quick and too spontaneous and without due regard for society’s norms.
She is lucky though to have an elderly aunt to spring to her defence. Although
that ends in humiliation for all concerned.
Women’s suffrage was a current obsession in
the early 1900s and the two main women were not actually involved but were
aspiring young women, keen to have an opinion on matters. Margaret in
particular is often credited with being intellectual. We all appreciated the
handling of gender in this tome. Women were beginning to run their own lives
and the young Schlegel women certainly did. They had agency as they had money
unlike the girls in Sense and Sensibility.
One member thought the new developments in
art and culture at the time such as the Art Nouveau movement affected middle
class culture and sensibilities. People were beginning to express themselves in
new ways.
The
rich could have various houses and an arrogance to live their lives as they
pleased, including treating their kids harshly.
The historic world of England with very set classes was vanishing.
Another feature of life at the time was the
love of all things German – particularly music and philosophy and for Germany
itself. The main characters are the children of a German army officer who
migrated to England and they first meet the Wilcoxes during a visit to Germany.
Their main interests seem to be German music and an intellectual life through
reading and discussions with like-minded people. Helen lives in Germany for a
period while she is estranged from her family.
The issue of class is of prime interest
through the novel. Some of us felt it was tongue-in-cheek at times, especially
in regard to the lower class:
We are not concerned with the very poor. They
are unthinkable, and only approachable by the statistician or the poet. This
story deals with gentlefolk, or those who are obliged to pretend that they are
gentlefolk. (Chapter 6, p. 46)
The issue of homosexuality is also in this
novel. Forster was a gay writer but of course it was hidden from public view.
Now we can see it more clearly. Apparently he was a virgin until he was 34,
living with his mother. We decided that Tibby was not gay but that is
debatable. There is little evidence either way.
One member was knowledgeable about the
origin of the house in Howard’s end – it
is based on a house called Rooksnest
in Hertfordshire where Forster lived from 1883 to 1893, which was owned by a
family called Howard.
Similarities with
other novels and helpful texts on the period
E M Forster was part of
the Bloomsbury set
and understood his characters well.
One
Minervan was keen for us to know about a couple of books about this group of
authors and intellectuals. One useful text is A S Byatt’s
The children’s book and the another is:
The world broke in two by B Goldstein (and published by
Bloomsbury).
We discussed the way intellectuals and
people in this period were often very formal in their relationships, even with
their children, and often neglected them and their care was left to nannies or boarding
schools. At least two of us had fathers who were treated in this fashion in
their youth. This reminded one member of the new film Vita and Virginia (2018)
Similarities with other writers were seen
with Thomas Hardy and Jane Austen’s Sense
and Sensibility. Marianne does share traits with Helen Schlegel – both
flighty, romantic and dreamy while Margaret Schlegel is the practical one
somewhat similar to Elinor Dashwood. There are some silly co-incidences too
which also occur in Austen’s novel. These explain some of Margaret’s
motivations.
Forster was criticizing the ‘intellectual
class’ in a subtle way. Leonard Bast was the most problematic character
reflecting changes of attitude. He is a result of urbanization and the lack of
access to education by people living on the edge of the middle class. We
concluded that Bast is a case study. His untimely death was symbolic. England
needed to deal with these people. We were astonished that Charles Wilcox
thought he could get away with the killing but his father realized that would
not be the case.
This novel reflects England and the changes
happening. Bast and his wife are not fully developed as characters. We thought
it was ironic that Helen Schlegel made money from her shares after offering the
money to Lionel Bas who refused to accept it.
The treatment of Helen’s baby reminded us
of The strays by Emily Bitto based on
the lives of John and Sunday Reed in Melbourne and their property called Heide.
Here artists lived selfish lives and allowed children to be neglected. Forster
is not interested in Helen’s child, it is just symbolic. He concentrates on the
Schlegels and Wilcoxes. Margaret and Helen are delightfully English in their
slight eccentricities, intellectually arty and creative. So there are many
aspects of Forster’s own life in this novel.
Other features
There
are long passages about the English countryside. Forster contrasts the Wilcoxes
who bought property without much care versus the romantic environment as shown
by Howards End, a house originally owned by the first Mrs Wilcox. This house
was picturesque and romantic and attracted the Schlegel girls with its big wych-elm
tree. Here is a lovely description of the country:
Margaret was fascinated by Oniton … the
rivers hurrying down ... the carelessly modelled masses of the lower hills,
thrilled her with poetry. The house was insignificant, but the prospect from it
would be an eternal joy… (Chapter 26, p. 227)
Margaret is the romantic who loves poetry
and connects country living with that concept while the Wilcoxes are prose
oriented and more oriented to the town. It also has to do with emotions – prose
versus pastoral poetry. Although Forster was sympathetic to the Schlegel’s view
of cultural life he is also disenchanted with it. Someone has to do business so
it is the more practical Wilcox family who supply the money and the stability
provided. So Forster humanizes Business.
We also talked about the original Mrs
Wilcox – did she know about Henry’s affair with Jacky who later became Mrs
Bast. In the film production Mrs Bast is depicted as a black woman.
This reminded us of Aunt Juley and her
arrival at Howards End at the beginning of the novel which turned out to be
embarrassing for all concerned, but especially for Helen Schlegel. The timing
was exciting.
During this train trip we get a glimpse of
the countryside and how it was just on the edge of the urbanization of London.
She traversed the immense viaduct whose arches span untroubled meadows and the
dreamy flow of Tewin Water. She skirted the parks of politicians. At times the
Great North Road accompanied her more suggestive of infinity than any railway
awakening after a nap of a hundred years, to such life as is conferred by the
stench of motor-cars… (Chapter 3, p13).
The Wilcox family were the pragmatic
developers of nations – as evidenced by Henry’s wealth coming from rubber in
Africa. At the end of the novel Margaret
takes control of the terrible situation – Charles’ murderous action and Henry’s
collapse. Margaret had played the submissive wife until that point. The younger
generation were taking over. We felt
that Charles had always been bullied by his father and so was not a true
representative of his generation. His father had constantly asserted his
authority over him. His wife Dolly though was a great character and was the
surprising one who told the Schlegel women the truth about Howards End and how
it had been bequeathed to Margaret.
We were charmed by the fairy-like nature of
Miss Avery and how she set up the house with the Schlegel books and furniture
and the sword which proved so dangerous. We felt that Howards End house gave
the book a sense of place and was a connection to place, whereas life was in
flux for the Schlegels in all the other places they lived. They were very sad to leave their
London house in Wickham Place as they had been raised there. It was also a sign that London was changing.
One member was keen for us to see all the
references to grey in the novel – grey skies, grey economic future and grey
showing spiritual poverty – metaphorical of course.
We all appreciated Forster’s succinct and
masterful language. He was extremely good at ‘nailing a point’. One prime example was when he is talking about moving house in chapter 17. 'The age of property holds bitter moments even for a proprietor...' (p 156)
We completed our discussion by talking
about Margaret and Henry and their relationship. She turned out to be the
strong one and very loving and she could also be uplifting. He was the decisionmaker and grounded her.
PRESENT: 9 members
