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A Great Unrecorded History: A New Life of E. M. Forster, by Wendy Moffat
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A REVELATORY LOOK AT THE INTIMATE LIFE OF THE GREAT AUTHOR—AND HOW IT SHAPED HIS MOST BE LOVED WORKS
With the posthumous publication of his long-suppressed novel Maurice in 1970, E. M. Forster came out as a homosexual— though that revelation made barely a ripple in his literary reputation. As Wendy Moffat persuasively argues in A Great Unrecorded History, Forster’s homosexuality was the central fact of his life. Between Wilde’s imprisonment and the Stonewall riots, Forster led a long, strange, and imaginative life as a gay man. He preserved a vast archive of his private life—a history of gay experience he believed would find its audience in a happier time.
A Great Unrecorded History is a biography of the heart. Moffat’s decade of detective work—including first-time interviews with Forster’s friends—has resulted in the first book to integrate Forster’s public and private lives. Seeing his life through the lens of his sexuality offers us a radically new view—revealing his astuteness as a social critic, his political bravery, and his prophetic vision of gay intimacy. A Great Unrecorded History invites us to see Forster— and modern gay history—from a completely new angle.
- Sales Rank: #381544 in Books
- Published on: 2010-05-11
- Released on: 2010-05-11
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.28" h x 1.34" w x 6.13" l, 1.48 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 416 pages
From Booklist
*Starred Review* It will come as no surprise to readers of literary fiction that E. M. Forster (1879–1970), author of such classic novels as Howards End (1910) and Passage to India (1924), was gay. His sexual orientation has been noted since the 1970 publication of his posthumous novel, Maurice, which was about love and sex between men. But Moffat places, more firmly than has been done by previous biographers, Forster’s homosexuality at the core of his being, both as the lodestar by which he lived his life and as a source of intense frustration because of social prohibition against depicting it in fiction. He realized early on his attraction to his own gender, and we are given, with no hint of salaciousness, an honest account of his sex life over the years. At once powerful and sensitive, Moffat’s irresistibly compelling and responsible biography sees an unimpressive physical persona whose shyness reduced him to “disappearing into the woodwork.” And his long public silence—silent in that he published no more novels while he lived, after Passage to India—can be attributed to his having “grown tired of the masquerade of propriety.” Forster may have been regarded as mousy, but this treatment of his life is undeniably robust. In fact, it shines with the beauty its subject was made sad that he did not possess. --Brad Hooper
Review
“[A Great Unrecorded History is] a well-written, intelligent and perceptive biography . . . [Moffat] uses the sources for our knowledge of Forster’s sexuality, including letters and diaries, without reducing the mystery and sheer individuality of Forster, without making his sexuality explain everything.” —Colm Tóibín, The New York Times Book Review
“None of [Forster’s] biographers have had either the will or the wherewithal to concentrate as closely on Forster’s sexuality as Wendy Moffat . . . In A Great Unrecorded History, she offers an insightful, revelatory portrait of a man who deeply resented having to hide such an important side of himself . . . Ms. Moffat’s overarching interests are in tracing Forster’s attitudes about sex and hypocrisy and in placing this increasingly outspoken figure within the context of his changing times.” —Janet Maslin, The New York Times
“Wendy Moffat’s reexamination of E. M. Forster identifies his homosexuality as the essence of his creative life. Using unpublished writings, she charts his gradual awakening to the moral, intellectual, and emotional significance of his homoerotic imagination. Her book is an astute and original new portrait of this major novelist.” —Michael Holroyd, author of A Strange Eventful History
“A Great Unrecorded History explores the intimate life of E. M. Forster with sensitivity and scholarship. Wendy Moffat writes with profound insight about a great writer who believed in the vital significance of personal connection while being unable to openly express his sexual feelings for the men he desired. She also gives us an illuminating picture of gay sexual culture in the first half of the twentieth century. This biography is at once an engrossing read and a book to cherish and go back to. Essential for understanding E. M. Forster and the times in which he lived.” —Sheila Rowbotham , author of Edward Carpenter
“Wendy Moffat’s biography of E. M. Forster is splendid—beautifully researched and written, imaginatively structured, and deeply revealing. We finally have a life of Forster that foregrounds his homosexuality and skillfully traces its impact on his life and art. We’ve had a long wait for a fully honest book on Forster—but at last we have it.” —Martin Duberman, author of Paul Robeson
“A Great Unrecorded History is a bold new re-imagining of Forster’s long career, which makes some striking connections between his life and work.” —D. J. Taylor, author of Bright Young People
About the Author
WENDY MOFFAT is a professor of English at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. A Great Unrecorded History is her first book.
Most helpful customer reviews
53 of 54 people found the following review helpful.
"I Should Want Everything Told, Everything."
By Foster Corbin
The great novelist E. M. Forster on the subject of his posthumous legacy wanted everything told. Wendy Moffat, to her credit, certainly does just that. In A GREAT UNRECORDED HISTORY, a quotation from Forster, as are all the chapter headings, Moffat draws from his journals and a "locked diary" that he kept for sixty years as well as interviews with his friends. She also includes voluminous notes and an extensive bibliography at the end of this most informative and heartwarming biography.
It of course has been long known by readers that Forster's novel MAURICE and a collection of short stories THE LIFE TO COME, dealing with love and sex between men, were published at his direction only after his death in 1970. Moffat writes extensively about MAURICE. One of the most moving portions of this biography appears early when Forster-- he was called "Morgan" by friends and family"-- showed a typewritten copy of the novel to Christopher Isherwood. His eyes wet with tears, Isherwood told Forster that he found the novel "wonderful and brave." Isherwood encouraged Forster to publish the novel-- in 1928, 1948, 1951-- to no avail, however. Forster finished MAURICE before he ever touched another man-- he had his first sexual encounter when he was 37-- and certainly that is one of the saddest facts about Forster's life. Sergeant Leonard Matlovich-- discharged from the USAF for being openly gay-- said something similar in his autobiography when he remembered that he had never touched another human being until he was well into adulthood. Through the years a copy of MAURICE made the rounds of Forster's friends although T. E. Lawrence chose not to read it. The author later in his life revised the novel to give it a happier ending.
In an example of life imitating art, as in the novel, Forster chose men from the lower classes as lovers. He, for example, remembered forty years after his affair with the Egyptian tram conductor Mohammed el Adl that this friendship was one of the two '"greatest things"' in his life. The two men had a single suit made for each of them to wear. It was slightly too big for Adl and a litle small for Forster. He was devastated when Adl died of consumption at the age of 23. He kept for the rest of his life studio photographs of Adl, the ticket stub from their first tram ride together and Adl's letters to him: "Do not forget your ever friend." Forster's longest relationship was with Bob Buckingham, a British policeman he met in 1930 who like Adl, married and named a child Morgan after Forster. Buckingham and his wife May-- with whom Forster became good friends in the most interesting of triangles-- were with him when the writer died in 1970.
Forster's homosexuality was at the center of who he was. He essentially stopped writing fiction for publication after A PASSAGE TO INDIA, which became a best seller and made him rich, because he believed he could not write about gay characters although he would never have used the word "gay" to describe the love between two men. Throughout his long life--he died at the age of 91-- Forster met other writers and moved in literary circles, both gay and otherwise, around the world, including the United States where he made two visits: D. H. Lawrence, W. H. Auden, Christopher Isherwood, Virginia and Leonard Woolf, C. P. Cavafy (Forster believed that meeting the very "out" Greek poet was one of the most fortunate things that happened to him), Henry James (to whom he did not warm) and Gore Vidal whom he did not like at all. He also wrote the libretto for Benjamin Britton's opera from Melville's BILLY BUDD and became friends with Paul Cadmus who included him in one of his paintings and George Platt Lynes who photographed him and Bob Buckingham on their visit to the U. S.
In what has to be one of the most unusual dinner parties ever held--"Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?"-- on their visit to the United States, Forster and Buckingham were the guests of honor at a party hosted by Glenway Wescott and Monroe Wheeler. Also in attendance were Joseph Campbell and Dr. Alfred Kinsey. What the two Brits did not know was that the theme of the party--Wescott and Wheeler's parties always had themes-- was sex although Forster and Buckingham rose to the occasion. Bob invited Kinsey to visit England to see Scotland Yard's confiscated pornography and Morgan took comfort in learning-- as did he-- that Kinsey believed that homosexual men were as much a male as heterosexual men although he chose not to discuss his sex life with the sex researcher.
It is easy to criticize Forster for the life he chose to live-- his relationship with his mother, for example. Apparently he always bowed to her wishes. In his own words: '"We were a classic case."' Other writers published gay works without having their careers ruined: Christopher Isherwood, James Baldwin Andre Gide, to name three, although Forster quipped that Gide did not have a mother. There is much, however, to admire about his life. He spoke out in defense of D. H. Lawrence and Radclyffe Hall and their right to publish LADY CHATTERLY'S LOVER and WELL OF LONELINESS. He also later in life advocated-- if cautiously-- for gay rights, supporting the Wolfenden Report that recommended that "homosexual acivity between consenting adults over the age of twenty-one be no longer a criminal offense." And Forster tried to bridge the gap between social classes, no easy task for a man of his time and station. Finally his friend Eudora Welty in her review of Forster's collection of short stories THE LIFE TO COME said that "his greatness surely had root in his capacity to treat all human relationships seriously and truthfully."
Ms. Moffat in this biography has created a really fine portrait of E. M Forster that brings to life this great writer and-- more importantly-- decent and good person.
27 of 28 people found the following review helpful.
Illuminating and engrossing
By Emily Wylie
It's not an easy thing to write with Forster-esque humanity, humor, and acute perception in any genre, but Wendy Moffat has done it here, in a biography of all things, writing a "new life" of E.M. Forster. I have loved Forster's work for a long time, and built an image of him in my head...so it was a risk, a bit, to read a biography of him....however, i've come out of it with my love intact and deepened. Moffat builds a portrait that I think Morgan Forster would have liked: amused, humane, casting a wide net to gather in all the parts of his life that informed his work. Which is nice, considering that Forster states his own agenda as "wishing to connect up all the fragments I was born with". Of course, within his lifetime, this was not possible to do - not publicly anyway: homophobic law and vicious anti-gay attitudes in early 20th century England made it necessary for him to conceal a great many parts of himself, and in consequence a great deal of his work.
Moffat situates his homosexuality where he did: right at the center of his life. From that understanding she works through his life to explain the mystery of why his last work was published in just his middle-age -- when he lived in sound mind and body much longer than that. In that seemingly barren time, we see a life teeming with connection and purpose. He was an avid patron and supporter of upcoming authors (many of them homosexual). He built a network of deep, sustaining friendships with men and women (of all stripes: mingling cab drivers and policemen with T.E. Lawrence and the Woolfs). He made quiet forays into advocacy against morality laws, and publicly defended young people endangered by them. At the same time, Forster searched for relationship and connection on another, romantic level: he wanted real affection and domestic bliss (not just sex) in a loving male-male relationship.
It's great fun getting to know Morgan Forster (as Moffat calls him), and all the other luminaries and regulars who wrote to him and of him in their letters and diaries. Which is something, considering the potentially heavy, even tragic, material. Moffat has an extraordinarily light touch, a quick, connective brain, and writes beautifully fluid prose. So it's an Important Book, for sure, but one you'll finish eagerly. How wonderful that we finally get to hear from a temperate genius on a subject we seem only now (barely) ready to understand: Forster wrote, at 85, "...how ANNOYED I am with Society for wasting my time by making homosexuality criminal. The subterfuges, the self-consciousness that might have been avoided." Indeed.
21 of 22 people found the following review helpful.
A fine, absorbing biography
By Michael Squires
Wendy Moffat's new biography opens in an amateur, theatrical way - probably the opening a literary agent demanded. But after she settles down to Forster's life and portrays the ways in which Forster crept out - passively and furtively - from his mother Lily's cruel thumb, the book is readable, insightful, well paced, and often highly absorbing. His Cambridge friends, from HOM to Leonard Woolf, reveal how central were his early university experiences. Later, the sexual relationships he managed to secure show an amazing tolerance for half-requited passion. Despite his core of passivity - he provided the equivalent of a lady's companion to his own mother - he managed to write several fascinating novels, all crisp with chagrin. HOWARDS END, we learn, is a superb rendering of aspects of Forster's experience, ably recalibrated to show both his extraordinary humanity and his terror of exposure. Alive with a good blend of specifics and analysis, Moffat's biography is recommended to those wanting a fresh portrait of a classic twentieth-century novelist whose star is gracefully falling.
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