What impressions do you receive from this passage of the four English characters involved? Comment on the atmosphere and effect of this episode and the means by which Forster achieves them.

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What impressions do you receive from this passage of the four English characters involved?

Comment on the atmosphere and effect of this episode and the means by which Forster achieves them.

Set at one of the few points in the novel in which all of the more major characters in the book are spending time together, this passage illustrates various attitudes and reactions evident in the people of the novel. These characters represent not only themselves but also the surrounding categories of people, particularly the four English characters present in this instance.

We have, for instance, Ronny Heaslop with his perfectly mimicked Anglo-Indian attitudes in the obvious prejudices against local Indians. Forster's choice of words in the description of Ronny's conversations with Fielding hints subtly at the impression that Ronny is a 'would-be' "sun-dried bureaucrat", a follower rather than one setting his own opinions and pace, and somehow, a newcomer trying to fit in with the local gang. His tone is almost too affable when he speaks to Fielding ("I say, old man..."), the "pseudo-heartiness" bringing to mind previous conversations between British established in India with the newcomers, such as to Mrs Moore or Adela. It is an impression of sticking together despite mutual aversion on a personal level, the advice essentially to distrust all not of one's own kind even to cooperation despite personal dislike. It is interesting to note in the apparently protective comment on leaving an "English girl... smoking with two Indians" the effect not just of the conjunction ('polo-playing us versus them Indians') but also of the split: the superior attitude, the confident advice, all somehow reflect a youth's disdain of age. Equally possible, however, is that he was merely seeing Fielding as a social inferior since the latter had never really been accepted among the other Anglo-Indians. Whatever the case, Ronny here is shown to be a sheep-blinding himself to other choices and possibilities, his entire scale on which Indians were measured not a matter of 'innocent or guilty', but rather 'how guilty', to follow the herd. This herd of white woolly-brained animals huddles together in the face of threat, a role reserved for the Indians in the novel, and protects itself by avoiding them as far as possible, and pretending they do not exist or matter.

Ronny in the extract behaves like this in his unwarranted prejudices against Godbole and Aziz, almost as though considering them sub-human in his reference to Fielding's having left Adela "alone". The fact that he, as does most of the Club, refers to Indians usually as a race rather than as individuals seems somehow to reinforce this idea, at times as though speaking of another species entirely. Individual personality is superfluous, transcended by race consciousness. He suspects them of wrongdoing, despite the fact that he had never met either man before; Aziz, especially, to whom Ronny "never even spoke" and obviously did not intend to is proclaimed "a bounder". Ronny's ignoring of Aziz here not only reflects the supposed general convention of the British here in India: that they "don't come across [the Indians] socially", but also the surety with which they make completely empty claims. These claims, as in other instances, are taken to be fact despite any lack of understanding of the people or situations, and like the unseen 'hyena' in the later car accident, taken to be undisputed fact. Ronny, like Callendar's summoning of Aziz in an earlier scene, is supremely oblivious to the negative impact he might have on Indians as a result of his high-handed behaviour. Thus he divests himself of all responsibility of Aziz's nerves, which had begun as a result of Ronny's exceedingly rude neglect of admitting Aziz's presence, much less conversation. It would seem in this extract, therefore, that Ronny characterizes the typical Anglo-Indian in his adoption of the 'party-line' in terms of attitude and behaviour.
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In contrast, the other side of the conversation appears to hold opinions entirely at odds with Ronny's. Fielding here comes across as a fairer, more logical character. He treats the Indians like equals, 'not seeing' "the harm" in Adela's interaction with the Aziz and Godbole, notices Aziz's discomfort, and tries to be polite despite Ronny's offensively officious pompousness. Curiously, he does seem to give Ronny a little of his own back in an apparently ironic tone ("... old man", line 6) that suggests his having taken offense to either Ronny's words or tone. This could perhaps be the ...

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