E. M. Forster

At a glance

Born 1879-01-01; died 1970-06-07.

Known as: writer, novelist, screenwriter, literary critic, and biographer. Citizenship: United Kingdom and United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

Listed as: human.

Who they were

Personal life Family From 1925 until his mother's death at age 90 in March 1945, Forster lived with her at the house of West Hackhurst in the village of Abinger Hammer , Surrey ; he continued to live there until September 1946. [ 1 ] His London base was 26 Brunswick Square from 1930 to 1939, after which he rented 9 Arlington Park Mansions in Chiswick until at least 1961. [ 2 ] [ 3 ] Friendships While stationed in Egypt, Forster became friendly with the Greek poet C. P. Cavafy ,

Edward Morgan Forster was an English author. He is best known for his novels, particularly A Room with a View (1908), Howards End (1910) and A Passage to India (1924). He also wrote numerous short stories, essays, speeches and broadcasts, as well as biographies and pageant plays. His short story "The Machine Stops" (1909) is often viewed as the beginning of technological dystopian fiction. He also co-authored the libretto to Benjamin Britten's opera Billy Budd (1951).

Early life

Educated at: Tonbridge School and King's College.

Early life Forster, born at 6 Melcombe Place, Dorset Square , London NW1, which no longer stands, was the only child of the Anglo-Irish Alice Clara "Lily" (née Whichelo) and a Welsh architect, Edward Morgan Llewellyn Forster. He was registered as Henry Morgan Forster, but accidentally baptised Edward Morgan Forster. [ 1 ] His father died of tuberculosis on 30 October 1880, before Forster's second birthday. [ 2 ] His father's sisters helped his mother to raise him.

Path and career

Awards / honours: James Tait Black Memorial Prize, Prometheus Award - Hall of Fame, Benson Medal, and Honorary doctor of Leiden University.

Career Forster circa 1917 In 1903, Forster travelled in Greece and Italy out of interest in their classical heritage. [ 1 ] He then sought a post in Germany , to learn the language, and spent several months in the summer of 1905 in Nassenheide, Pomerania (now the Polish village of Rzędziny ), as a tutor to the children of the writer Elizabeth von Arnim . He wrote a short memoir of this experience, which was one of the happiest times in his life. [ 2 ] [ 3 ]

Work Novels The monument to Forster in Stevenage , Hertfordshire, near Rooks Nest where Forster grew up. He based the setting for his novel Howards End on this area, now informally known as Forster Country. Forster had five novels published in his lifetime. Although Maurice was published shortly after his death, it had been written nearly sixty years earlier. His first novel, Where Angels Fear to Tread (1905), tells of Lilia, a young English widow who falls in love with an Italian,

Why this date

E. M. Forster appears on our June 7 calendar for 1970 as a death entry.