Quotes & Sayings About Forster

He lived to near the things he loved to seem poetical. — E. M. Forster

The sadness of the incomplete, the sadness that is often Life, but should never be Art. — E. M. Forster

One doesn't come to Italy for niceness," was the retort; "one comes for life. Buon giorno! Buon giorno! — E. M. Forster

Towns are excrescences, gray fluxions, where men, hurrying to find one another, have lost themselves. — E. M. Forster

If God could tell the story of the Universe, the Universe would become fictitious. — E. M. Forster

I did not fear that I might tread upon a live rail and be killed. I feared something far more intangible-doing what was not contemplated by the Machine. Then I said to myself, "Man is the measure", and I went, and after many visits I found an opening. — E. M. Forster

I knew you read the Symposium in the vac," he said in a low voice.
Maurice felt uneasy.
"Then you understand - without me saying more - "
"How do you mean?"
Durham could not wait. People were all around them, but with eyes that had gone intensely blue he whispered, "I love you. — E. M. Forster

Let her go to Italy!" he cried. "Let her meddle with what she doesn't understand! — E. M. Forster

She hated war and liked soldiers - it was one of her amiable inconsistencies. — E. M. Forster

There's nothing like a debate to teach one quickness. I often wish I had gone in for them when I was a youngster. It would have helped me no end. — E. M. Forster

The main facts in human life are five: birth, food, sleep, love and death. — E. M. Forster

Like all her friends, I miss her greatly ... But ... I am sure there is no case for lamentation ... Virginia Woolf got through an immense amount of work, she gave acute pleasure in new ways, she pushed the light of the English language a little further against darkness. Those are facts. — E. M. Forster

God has put us on earth to love our neighbors and to show it, and He is omnipresent, even in India, to see how we are succeeding. — E. M. Forster

He had awoken too late for happiness, but not for strength, and could feel an austere joy, as of a warrior who is homeless but stands fully armed. — E. M. Forster

She failed - visions do not come when we try, though they may come through trying. But — E. M. Forster

There had always been something to worry him ever since he could remember, always something that distracted him in the pursuit of beauty. For he did pursue beauty, and, therefore, Margaret's speeches did flutter away from him like birds. — E. M. Forster

Axiom : Novel must have either one living character or a perfect pattern: fails otherwise. — E. M. Forster

The armour of falsehood is subtly wrought out of darkness, and hides a man not only from others, but from his own soul. — E. M. Forster

Live in fragments no longer, only connect. — E. M. Forster

Disdaining the heroic outfit, excitable in her methods, garrulous, episodical, shrill, she misled her lover much as she misled her aunt. He mistook her fertility for weakness. He supposed her "as clever as they make 'em," but no more, not realizing that she was penetrating to the depths of his soul, and approving of what she found there. — E. M. Forster

Hannah kept her eyes forward, trained on two rows of rusted showerheads stuck in facing walls. Sixteen in all. The room was paved with white tile, chipped and discolored by age and use. — Rebecca Forster

If we lived for ever, what you say would be true. But we have to die, we have to leave life presently. Injustice and greed would be the real thing if we lived for ever. As it is, we must hold to other things, because Death is coming. I love death - not morbidly, but because He explains. He shows me the emptiness of Money. Death and Money are the eternal foes. Not Death and Life. . . . Death destroys a man: the idea of Death saves him. Behind the coffins and the skeletons that stay the vulgar mind lies something so immense that all that is great in us responds to it. Men of the world may recoil from the charnel-house that they will one day enter, but Love knows better. Death is his foe, but his peer, and in their age-long struggle the thews of Love have been strengthened, and his vision cleared, until there is no one who can stand against him. — E. M. Forster

Do you suppose there's any difference between spring in nature and spring in man? But there we go, praising the one and condemning the other as improper, ashamed that the same laws work eternally through both. — E. M. Forster

All a child's life depends on the ideal it has of its parents. Destroy that and everything goes - morals, behavior, everything. Absolute trust in someone else is the essence of education. — E. M. Forster

Money pads the edges of things. — E. M. Forster

One minute. You know nothing about him. He probably has his own joys and interests- wife, children, snug little home. That's where we practical fellows'- he smiled-'are more tolerant than you intellectuals. We live and let live, and assume that things are jogging on fairly well elsewhere, and that the ordinary plain man may be trusted to look after his own affairs. — E. M. Forster

Mr Abrahams was a preparatory schoolmaster of the old-fashioned sort. He cared neither for work nor games, but fed his boys well and saw that they did not misbehave. The rest he left to the parents, and did not speculate how much the parents were leaving to him. Amid mutual compliments the boys passed out into a public school, healthy but backward, to receive upon undefended flesh the first blows of the world. — 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

I think the failure of The American church to affirm the goodness of civilizational life is our greatest failing today. — Greg 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

Life is like a public performance on the violin, in which you must learn the intrument as you go along — E. M. Forster

Death destroys a man, but the idea of death saves him. — E. M. Forster

If there is on earth a house with many mansions, it is the house of words. — E. M. Forster

Few travelled in these days, for, thanks to the advance of science, the earth was exactly alike all over. Rapid intercourse, from which the previous civilization had hoped so much, had ended by defeating itself. What was the good of going to Peking when it was just like Shrewsbury? Why return to Shrewsbury when it would all be like Peking? Men seldom moved their bodies; all unrest was concentrated in the soul. — E. M. Forster

One marvels why the middle classes still insist on so much discomfort for their children at such expense to themselves. — E. M. Forster

What indeed is there to say? To be or not to be married, that was the question, and they had decided it in the affirmative. — E. M. Forster

Discussion keeps a house alive. It cannot stand by bricks and mortar alone. — E. M. Forster

Does it seem reasonable that she should play so wonderfully, and live so quietly? I suspect that one day she will be wonderful in both. The water-tight compartments in her will break down, and music and life will mingle. — E. M. Forster

He chanced to be in a lucid critical mood, and would not sympathize with exaltation. — E. M. Forster

My father says that there is only one perfect view - the view of the sky straight over our heads, and that all these views on earth are but bungled copies of it. — E. M. Forster

If high ideals make a young man rude, the sooner he gets rid of them the better, — E. M. Forster

Art for art's sake? I should think so, and more so than ever at the present time. It is the one orderly product which our middling race has produced. It is the cry of a thousand sentinels, the echo from a thousand labyrinths, it is the lighthouse which cannot be hidden. It is the best evidence we can have of our dignity. — E. M. Forster

I have only got down on to paper, really, three types of people: the person I think I am, the people who irritate me, and the people I'd like to be. — E. M. Forster

At Oxford he learned that the importance of human beings has been vastly over rated by specialists. — E. M. Forster

It is thus, if there is any rule, that we ought to die
neither as victim nor as fanatic, but as the seafarer who can greet with an equal eye the deep that he is entering, and the shore that he must leave. — E. M. Forster

She had not died there. A funeral is not death, any more than baptism is birth or marriage union. All three are the clumsy devices, coming now too late, now too early, by which society would measure the quick motions of man. — E. M. Forster

He could hear church bells as he drowsed, both from the civil station and from the missionaries out beyond the slaughter house--different bells and rung with
different intent, for one set was calling firmly to Anglo-India, and the other feebly to mankind.
He did not object to the first set; the other he ignored, knowing their inefficiency. — E. M. Forster

London was beginning to illuminate herself against the night. Electric lights sizzled and jagged in the main thoroughfares, gas-lamps in the side streets glimmered a canary gold or green. The sky was a crimson battlefield of spring, but London was not afraid. Her smoke mitigated the splendour, and the clouds down Oxford Street were a delicately painted ceiling, which adorned while it did not distract. — E. M. Forster

But they did not chatter much, for the boy, when he liked a person, would as soon sit silent in his company as speak. — E. M. Forster

What the world most needs today are negative virtues - not minding people, not being huffy, touchy, irritable or revengeful. — E. M. Forster

Yes, I think the apostle spoons could have gone as rent," said Margaret. — E. M. Forster

For the barrier of language is sometimes a blessed barrier, which only lets pass what is good. Or-to put the thing less cynically-we may be better in new clean words, which have never been tainted by our pettiness or vice. — E. M. Forster

By the side of the everlasting Why there is a Yes
a transitory Yes if you like, but a Yes. — E. M. Forster

Athletes, he believed, were simple, straightforward people, cruel and brutal if you like, but never petty. They knocked you down and hurt you, and then went on their way rejoicing. — E. M. Forster

There are only two rules. One is E. M. Forster's guide to Alexandria; the best way to know Alexandria is to wander aimlessly. The second is from the Psalms; grin like a dog and run about through the city. — Jan Morris

Italy was offering her the most priceless of all possessions - her own soul. — E. M. Forster

You can do what you like, but the outcome will be the same. — E. M. Forster

The world, he believed, is a globe of men who are trying to reach one another and can best do so by the help of goodwill plus culture and intelligence. — E. M. Forster

While behavior is almost always motivated, it is also almost always biologically, culturally and situationally determined as well. — E. M. Forster

A matter neither sensual nor sensational is ignored by the art of today. — E. M. Forster

It is devilish difficult to criticise society & also create human beings. — E. M. Forster

It is fate that I am here,' George persisted, 'but you can call it Italy if it makes you less unhappy. — E. M. Forster

People have their own deaths as well as their own lives, and even if there is nothing beyond death, we shall differ in our nothingness. — E. M. Forster

He questioned Maurice, who, when he grasped the point, was understood to reply that deeds are more important than words. — E. M. Forster

The advance of regret can be so gradual that it is impossible to say yesterday I was happy, today I am not. — E. M. Forster

Let your ideas be second-hand, and if possible tenth-hand, for then they will be far removed from that disturbing element - direct observation. Do not learn anything about this subject of mine - the French Revolution. Learn instead what I think that Enicharmon thought Urizen thought Gutch thought Ho-Yung thought Chi-Bo-Sing thought Lafcadio Hearn thought Carlyle thought Mirabeau said about the French Revolution. — E. M. Forster

Katherine Anne [Porter] treated them like favored nephews; she even cooked meals for them. Unfortunately, however, beneath Christopher's deference and flattery, there was a steadily growing aggression. By her implicit claim to be the equal of Katherine Mansfield and even Virginia Woolf, Katherine Anne had stirred up Christopher's basic literary snobbery. How dare she, he began to mutter to himself, this vain old frump, this dressed-up cook in her arty finery, how dare she presume like this! And he imagined a grotesque scene in which he had to introduce her and somehow explain her to Virginia, Morgan [Forster] and the others . . . [t]hus Katherine Anne became the first of an oddly assorted collection of people who, for various reasons, made up their minds that they would never see Christopher again. The others: Charlie Chaplin, Benjamin Britten, Cole Porter, Lincoln Kirstein. — Christopher Isherwood

Those who search for truth are too conscious of the maze to be hard on others. — E. M. Forster

The work of art assumes the existence of the perfect spectator, and is indifferent to the fact that no such person exists. — E. M. Forster

Rickie had a young man's reticence. He generally spoke of "a friend," "a person I know," "a place I was at." When the book of life is opening, our readings are secret, and we are unwilling to give chapter and verse. Mr. Pembroke, who was half way through the volume, and had skipped or forgotten the earlier pages, could not understand Rickie's hesitation, nor why with such awkwardness he should pronounce the harmless dissyllable "Ansell. — E. M. Forster

The past is devoid of meaning like the present, and a refuge for cowards. — E. M. Forster

It never bored them to hear words, words; they breathed them with the cool night air, never stopping to analyse; the name of the poet, Hafiz, Hali, Iqbal, was sufficient guarantee. India - a hundred Indias - whispered outside beneath the indifferent moon, but for the time India seemed one and their own, and they regained their departed greatness by hearing its departure lamented, they felt young again because reminded that youth must fly. — E. M. Forster

It is the starved imagination, not the well nourished, that is afraid. — E. M. Forster

Miss Abbott, don't worry over me. Some people are born not to do things. I'm one of them. — E. M. Forster

A man walks fast along the forecourt of the station towards a gate, moving towards a train that's about to leave. I get shivery all over as I watch the back of his head, which is about Yuan's height, with hair and a neckline just like his. My eyes tell me what my mind knows cannot be true. I follow him along seeking the one thing that would confirm him as someone else. The man turns his head slightly to talk to a train official. I can see his nose in profile. My eyes sting. — Dayo Forster

I don't think literature will be purged until its philosophic pretentiousness is extruded, and I shant live to see that purge, nor perhaps when it has happened will anything survive. — E. M. Forster

Cannot you see, cannot all you lecturers see, that it is we that are dying, and that down here the only thing that really lives in the Machine? We created the Machine, to do our will, but we cannot make it do our will now. It was robbed us of the sense of space and of the sense of touch, it has blurred every human relation and narrowed down love to a carnal act, it has paralyzed our bodies and our wills, and now it compels us to worship it. The Machine develops - but not on our lies. The Machine proceeds - but not to our goal. We only exist as the blood corpuscles that course through its arteries, and if it could work without us, it would let us die. — E. M. Forster

The only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little farther down our particular path than we have yet got ourselves. — E. M. Forster

Be soft, even if you stand to get squashed. — E. M. Forster

She was parting from these Wilcoxes for the second time. Paul and his mother, ripple and great wave, had flowed into her life and ebbed out of it forever. The ripple had left no traces behind: the wave had strewn at her feet fragments torn from the unknown. A curious seeker, she stood for a while at the verge of the sea that tells so little, but tells a little, and watched the outgoing of this last tremendous tide. — E. M. Forster

Only a struggle twists sentimentality and lust together into love. — E. M. Forster

A poem is true if it hangs together. Information points to something else. A poem points to nothing but itself. — E. M. Forster

Yes, oh dear, yes, the novel tells a story. — E. M. Forster

I am so used to seeing the sort of play which deals with one man and two women. They do not leave me with the feeling I have made a full theatrical meal they do not give me the experience of the multiplicity of life. — E. M. Forster

Chess is a forcing house where the fruits of character can ripen more fully than in life — E. M. Forster

and Imperialism always had been one of her difficulties. — E. M. Forster

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

Conversation was tedious; she wanted something big, and she believed that it would have come to her on the windswept platform of an electric tram. — E. M. Forster

He pushed against her, their hips grinding slowly, and it was Lyssa's turn to moan. — Kate Forster

I have almost completed a long novel, but it is unpublishable until my death and England's. — E. M. Forster

for Fr Bede, a contemplative lifestyle in which one seeks to deepen one's consciousness of God was much more important than having an articulate and theologically accurate explanation of one's spirituality. — Dion A. Forster

Freedom does not guarantee masterpieces. — E. M. Forster

What foolsmiddle-classgirls are to expect other people to respect the same gods as themselves and E M Forster. — Margaret Drabble

I always think it's interesting to switch genres, because if I read a script and I know exactly how to manifest a story, I don't really want to do it anymore, because I've already done it in my head. — Marc Forster

They chose to regard it as a miraculous preservation. — E. M. Forster

She watched the moon, whose radiance stained with primrose the purple of the surrounding sky. In England the moon had seemed dead and alien; here she was caught in the shawl of night together with earth and all the other stars. — E. M. Forster

I don't like taking from anyone. I'd rather be a giver, though not for any worthy reason. It's about control, obviously. If I give, I control; if I take, I am controlled. If someone offers me something for free I am at once suspicious. — Margaret Forster

My dear,' said the old men gently, 'I think that you are repeating what you have heard older people say. You are pretending to be touchy; but you are not really. Stop being so tiresome, and tell me instead what part of the church you want to see. To take you to it will be a real pleasure. — E. M. Forster

Ah, but you see, I didn't want to be fair. — E. M. Forster

It isn't possible to love and part. You will wish that it was. You can transmute love, ignore it, muddle it, but you can never pull it out of you. I know by experience that the poets are right: love is eternal. — E. M. Forster