Some Interviews with E. M. Forster, 1957-58, 1965 - British novelist

EMF Well, I've written all that someplace. I brought Butler into A Room with a View. It's his commonplace books(12) and people that really influence you.

WS In your piece appearing some years back in the New York Times Book Review entitled "Cocoanut & Co: Entrance to an Abandoned Novel,"(15) editorial mention was made of an unpublished novel. Does such a novel exist? I have heard others speak of it as well. [At this his face clouded a little. He seemed a bit resentful and wondered where I had received the information but did not press me for an answer.]

EMF Yes, I have such a novel. [At this I dropped the subject, hoping to ask at a later meeting if I might read it. This was, of course, the "homosexual" novel, posthumously published as Maurice.]

At this point the discussion began to wind down. He mentioned my Mark Rutherford book, remarking that he did not much like Mark Rutherford (I'd have been surprised if he had!) and commenting that he once knew Mabel Marsh and Sophia Partridge, friends of Hale White in his old age. I asked where G. Lowes Dickinson used to live at King's and we spoke briefly of his just-appeared article in the London Magazine entitled "De Senectute," dealing with his thoughts on turning 80.(14) He then showed me a book by William Plomer entitled Museum Pieces and asked if I'd seen it. I said no and he insisted I borrow it. He asked how long I was staying in England and seemed pleased when I said until May. "You must come and see me again," he said. He took my address, promised to send the Stallybrass bibliography when he received it, and accompanied me to the landing. We shook hands - the softest hands I think I had ever held! I felt somewhat dissatisfied with the interview, since I had stayed fearfully far from the novels, but I was reassured by his warmth and cordiality.

NOVEMBER 6, 1957, ABOUT 5:30-6:00 p.m.

The purpose of this visit was to pick up Oliver Stallybrass's checklist of EMF's works, which EMF had informed me by postcard had arrived. I asked about his foot and EMF replied: "The doctor thinks it is gout but is not quite convinced because it is not painful enough!" I was about to leave when EMF asked me if I had any further questions. I was caught off-guard and came up with some rather old chestnuts.

WS Can you say anything more about Moore's influence?

EMF I got what I got from Moore indirectly. I never had any formal philosophy and don't think I ever read Principia Ethica. Most of the Moore I absorbed I got through H. O. Meredith.(15)

WS In reading about Keynes's enthusiastic response to Moore, I wonder if he didn't, consciously or unconsciously, influence most of your Cambridge generation.

EMF Very likely.

WS What Cambridge people influenced you most strongly?

EMF G.L. Dickinson. Also Wedd - who used to occupy these rooms.

WS I am conscious in your writing of a consistent, stable sensibility relatively unchanged from past to present. Can you think of any major fluctuations in feelings or attitudes? [This was a question born of desperation. I think I was cribbing from a comment Elizabeth Bowen had made.](16)