Maurice

Maurice (1971) is a coming-of-age novel and love story by English author E. M. Forster. Like much of Forster’s work, it straddles the realist and modernist eras; stylistically, it resembles the literature of the 19th century, but its themes—in particular, its depiction of unconscious experience—anticipate the work of writers like Virginia Woolf and D. H. Lawrence. Drafted between 1913 and 1914, it was not published until 1971—one year after Forster’s death—because of its subject matter; Maurice depicts being gay both openly and positively. All page numbers in this study guide refer to the 1993 W. W. & Norton edition of the work.

Plot Summary

Maurice Hall—a middle-class, turn-of-the-century English boy—is about to enter public school (the equivalent of private high school in the modern US). Since Maurice is fatherless, a teacher at Maurice’s childhood school gives him a birds-and-bees-style talk before he graduates. However, the explanation leaves Maurice confused and alienated.

Maurice grows up good-natured, though not especially scholarly or self-reflective. After graduating public school, he goes to Cambridge, where he meets the intellectual and upper-class Clive Durham. Maurice feels drawn to Clive for reasons he can’t articulate, and the two become close friends. When Clive, who has known that he’s gay from a young age, tells Maurice that he’s in love with him, Maurice initially responds with shocked dismissal.