Paper about Greece and Platonic love in "Maurice" (the novel)
I've just read an interesting paper, which is a reading of 'Maurice' in the context of Platonic love (éros) as it is described in Platos' Symposium and Phaedrus, and related to the actual context of Maurice's Edwardian England. The author suggest that in this light it's not surprising at all that Clive should suddenly 'change' - that within a (Athenian) Hellenic framework it makes sense.
Here's the link (PDF download): Greece and Platonic Love in E. M. Forster's Maurice by P. Gilabert Baberà
Since Forster was clasically educated, I think it makes a lot of sense to do an interpretation such as this - but I think it*s also equally possible to interpret Clive as a suppressed, closeted homosexual man.
That (supposedly) sudden 'conversion' of Clive's is rather puzzling in the book and it's no wonder Merchant/Ivory looked for a more easily accessible explanation. I've never really liked it in the film though, but Forster's explanation have always seemed to me as a too simple and badly used plot device as well.
Here's the link (PDF download): Greece and Platonic Love in E. M. Forster's Maurice by P. Gilabert Baberà
Since Forster was clasically educated, I think it makes a lot of sense to do an interpretation such as this - but I think it*s also equally possible to interpret Clive as a suppressed, closeted homosexual man.
That (supposedly) sudden 'conversion' of Clive's is rather puzzling in the book and it's no wonder Merchant/Ivory looked for a more easily accessible explanation. I've never really liked it in the film though, but Forster's explanation have always seemed to me as a too simple and badly used plot device as well.