[beppe]

The strongest impression after reading the book, is how actual is E.M. Forster, in language and in positions, about individual dignity and freedom.

" Italy had quickened Cecil, not to tolerance, but to irritation. He saw that the local society was narrow, but, instead of saying, "Does that very much matter?" he rebelled, and tried to substitute for it the society he called broad. He did not realize that Lucy had consecrated her environment by the thousand little civilities that create a tenderness in time, and that though her eyes saw its defects, her heart refused to despise it entirely. Nor did he realize a more important point—that if she was too great for this society, she was too great for all society, and had reached the stage where personal intercourse would alone satisfy her. A rebel she was, but not of the kind he understood—a rebel who desired, not a wider dwelling-room, but equality beside the man she loved. For Italy was offering her the most priceless of all possessions—her own soul." This is very high.

Actual but a little too high for our times. The film is easier to understand because details that are critical to the story are anticipated, while in the book they appear only in the final chapter. George behavior in Florence, in the book is less than whispered and left for our fantasy and sensitivity (imagination?), thus giving much joy to the curious reader. The movie is indeed an excellent translation through the 100 years gap in the sensibility of the audience.

I got the impression that Forster started to write the novel without having a plan. Between Florence and England there is a clear change. Not of language, as the images that are evoked in my mind have the same photographic quality, but of theatrical quality. The characters are now described explicitly more than being represented by their acting. It looks like there is a set of notes that he wrote for himself and that make him free to proceed on a different tack, with the important characters in play, modified, made more real and with more depth, with their stories, as it fitted his purposes.

The characters and how they play and interplay.

By far the more entertaining are Cecil and Charlotte. So rich of mannerisms, so easy to be laughed at, so effective in causing devastating effects on the story.

While Charlotte is the deus ex machina (George describes her dealings and her actions in the last chapter, she is Fate in person), Cecil is called to interpret many parts. As comic of course, member of a fringe London society, for the social efforts of the mother (we would call her a cultural operator), totally frigid and self centered. Disastrous as amoroso, and as everything else. Unsinkable though.
As counterpart to his rival George. While George is instinctive, one with nature, Fate, emotions, love, equality principles, political correctness, nice complexion, brilliant tennis, and more and more, Cecil is to be seen inside (see the scene in the wood), is just intellectual, rational (but maybe cretin), ineffective, fake and vane. Who will win?

But George of course. He speaks the language of Nature, of Destiny, of Love, of Instinct. The old battle between Dionysus and Apollo that interests so much the Cambridge and Oxford Dons, is won by Dionysus, in a pond, in a field of violets and in a room with a view. George is never explained much, of course he is the mysterious nature, we must imagine him as we please. BTW George is the character that since the start I like the most, and with whom I identify a bit.

Yes it is a romance, no doubt. There are some elements of bildung, but they are not the key. The one that I appreciate most is in the last chapter.

"He was a boy after all. When it came to the point, it was she who remembered the past, she into whose soul the iron had entered, she who knew whose room this had been last year. It endeared him to her strangely that he should be sometimes wrong."

Forster knew. Some of us know or have experienced this. That strangely is a gem. A test to propose to a woman in love. There are several instances where Lucy observes her own reactions and is surprised or moved.

More than romance and a bit of bildung the scope of the novel is the criticism of a middle class that was bound by conventions, and unaware of its inadequacy.

"It was at one of those entertainments where the upper classes entertain the lower. ..."
The words are straight. The tone is neutral. Irony roars in the ears like Niagara falls...

"The seats were filled with a respectful audience, and the ladies and gentlemen of the parish, under the auspices of their vicar, sang, or recited, or imitated the drawing of a champagne cork." There.

He hates his countrymen, openly and without reserve.
" ... their anxiety to keep together being only equaled by their desire to go different directions."

The substance is the fabric of wonderful wit and wisdom. The continuous play of hide and seek with the reader, the smiles, the winks. It is a very lovely novel. It is holding well the passing of time. It is certainly a great classic.

It applies to us, also.
" here was a very foolish old man, as well as a very irreligious one." I know a few of the MR members that might fit.