E. M. Forster - A Passage to India (1924)

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Like all gossip—it's merely one of those half-alive things that try to crowd out real life.

E. M. Forster
I'm a holy man minus the holiness. Hand that on to your three spies, and tell them to put it in their pipes.

E. M. Forster
When that strange race nears the dust and is condemned as untouchable, then nature remembers the physical perfection that she accomplished elsewhere, and throws out a god-not many, but one here and there, to prove to society how little its categories impress her.

E. M. Forster
It is easy to sympathize at a distance,' said an old gentleman with a beard. 'I value more the kind word that is spoken close to my ear.

E. M. Forster
I believe in teaching people to be individuals, and to understand other individuals.

E. M. Forster
Where there is officialism every human relationship suffers.

E. M. Forster
At the moment they vanished they were everywhere, the cool benediction of the night descended, the stars sparkled, and the whole universe was a hill.

E. M. Forster
Nothing in India is identifiable, the mere asking of a question causes it to disappear or to merge in something else.

E. M. Forster
It was unbearable, and he thought again, 'How unhappy I am!' and became happier.

E. M. Forster
The echo began in some indescribable way to undermine her hold on life. Coming at a moment when she chanced to be fatigued, it had managed to murmur, "Pathos, piety, courage—they exist, but are identical, and so is filth. Everything exists, nothing has value." If one had spoken vileness in that place, or quoted lofty poetry, the [echo's] comment would have been the same — "Ou-boum."

E. M. Forster
The sun was already declining and each of the trees held a premonition of night.

E. M. Forster
Life never gives us what we want at the moment that we consider appropriate. Adventures do occur, but not punctually.

E. M. Forster
Most of life is so dull that there is nothing to be said about it, and the books and talks that would describe it as interesting are obliged to exaggerate, in the hope of justifying their own existence. Inside its cocoon of work or social obligation, the human spirit slumbers for the most part, registering the distinction between pleasure and pain, but not nearly as alert as we pretend. There are periods in the most thrilling day during which nothing happens, and though we continue to exclaim, I do enjoy myself, or, I am horrified, we are insincere.

E. M. Forster
But it struck him that people are not really dead until they are felt to be dead. As long as there is some misunderstanding about them, they possess a sort of immortality.

E. M. Forster
Excuse my mistakes, realize my limitations. Life is not easy as we know it on the earth.

E. M. Forster
In Europe life retreats out of the cold, and exquisite fireside myths have resulted—Balder, Persephone—but [in India] the retreat is from the source of life, the treacherous sun, and no poetry adorns it because disillusionment cannot be beautiful. Men yearn for poetry though they may not confess it; they desire that joy shall be graceful and sorrow august and infinity have a form, and India fails to accommodate them.

E. M. Forster
'Why can't we be friends now?' said the other, holding him affectionately. 'It's what I want. It's what you want.' But the horses didn't want it — they swerved apart: the earth didn't want it, sending up rocks through which riders must pass single file; the temple, the tank, the jail, the palace, the birds, the carrion, the Guest House, that came into view as they emerged from the gap and saw Mau beneath: they didn't want it, they said in their hundred voices 'No, not yet,' and the sky said 'No, not there.'

E. M. Forster
The so called white races are really pinko-grey.

E. M. Forster
Hope, politeness, the blowing of a nose, the squeak of a boot, all produce 'boum'.

E. M. Forster
All invitations must proceed from heaven perhaps; perhaps it is futile for men to initiate their own unity, they do but widen the gulfs between them by the attempt.

E. M. Forster