"Oh why is it still all my duty? When will I be free from your worries?" mutters Mrs. Moore as she collapses into the delirious madness of spiritual despair (228). After being E.M. Forster's most sympathetic character for almost all of A Passage to India, she is suddenly immobilized after her experience in the Marabar Caves; his perspective, his thoughts, and even his language degenerate into wizened cynicism and practically incoherent ramblings. Indeed, the last of these seemingly irrational monologues convinces Ronny that his mother has completely fallen; he sends her back to England believing that India has warped her sense of reality. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Looking more closely at one of these reflection-driven monologues, however, we find that Mrs. Moore has experienced a realization that has completely annihilated her distinctly “English” set of values. By analyzing the structure of these thoughts, the new ideology that drives them, and the possibility of their resolution, we find that Mrs. Moore's revelations and subsequent transformation arise from a surprising anti-vision. The undifferentiated echoes of the Caves have convinced Mrs. Moore that her value scheme is prosaic and worthless, and her eventual collapse is the result of her deeper awareness that without the superficial tendencies of everyday life, she is left with absolutely nothing. Moore seems to go on endlessly in his last conversation with Ronny and Adela, a short passage stands out that requires in-depth interpretation: Oh, why is it still all my duty? When will I be free from your worries? He was in the cave and you were in the cave and so on… and to us a Son is born, to us a Child is given… and I am good and he is bad and we are saved? and ending all the echo. (228)When looking at the structure of these thoughts, the question pattern clearly deserves attention. What drives Mrs. Moore to ask such seemingly vague questions? More importantly, does he get any response? One might suspect that his questions are rhetorical or stream-of-consciousness delusions. However, there is clearly a structure whereby the entire monologue is a statement, rather than a question. Instead of leaving these inquiring thoughts open, the echo puts an end to it all. A question mark means nothing, a question itself means nothing, the echo (and whatever this echo represents) ends all curiosity, all discovery, all possibility for a new perspective. In a sense, Mrs. Moore realizes that her ideas are futile since the echo will indiscriminately erase every thought she produces. In this awareness lies the source of his desperation: his constant questions regarding spiritual depth and understanding must be echoed rather than answered. The echoes themselves seem resistant to critical interpretation, but Mrs. Moore's earlier explanation of "everything exists, nothing has value" proves remarkably lucid (165). All thoughts, no matter how significant or trivial, are indistinct when reflected against the walls of the Marabar Caves. "Everything exists" in that it persists without definition, without aesthetic or spiritual consistency; at the same time, however, "nothing has value", since in this echo everything is denied (165). The superficial order of his culture – and his scheme of values ​​– are completely erased by the chaos and disorder reflected in the echo. His only choice is to retreat into the self, an entity he has neither cultivated nor examined in his previous life. Consequentially,he collapses in frustrated despair and empty remorse, realizing that he has neither the strength nor the perspective to continue living. Looking at the passage again, Forster's use of pronouns also proves important in understanding the structuring of Mrs. Moore's thought process. . When these pronouns are highlighted, the questions appear framed to emphasize them: Oh why is everything still _my_ duty? When will I be free from your worries? He was in the cave and you were in the cave and so on... and to us a Son is born, to us a Child is given... and I am good and he is bad and we are saved? (228)Mr. Moore uses these pronouns deliberately to emphasize the essence of his antivision. First, the pronouns illustrate the progression of its realization: it moves from the idea of ​​one's duty to that of another individual human being and finally to the collective whole. In a way, Ms. Moore discovered the isolating nature of her cave experience. Not only are her thoughts and feelings useless, but so are the thoughts and feelings of Ronny, Adela, Aziz, and everyone else around her. She cannot look to others for strength, in fact, she almost feels obligated to muster enough inner strength both for herself and for the rest of those who are unenlightened. Furthermore, the pronouns accentuate how crucial the words “I,” “we,” and “us” are to the value scheme supported by Mrs. Moore and the rest of British culture. The British conscience finds its center in personality interest, collective duty and, above all, dogma of both personal and collective salvation. However, the Caves' rejection and denial of this consciousness destroys Mrs. Moore's conception of her world. She has, in fact, come face to face with a fundamental tenet of Hinduism: the highest experience requires an abrogation of the self and finds herself unable to recover from the intensity of the vision (Flod, 75). Interestingly, the source of Mrs. Moore's ultimate desperation lies in her inability to find an adequate substitute for pronouns: she perceives the echo in terms of her own ego and therefore cannot develop a more universal perspective. Furthermore, Ms. Moore's heavy use of pronouns reflects her awareness of the falsity of interactions. Realizing that his own value scheme has no intrinsic importance, he sees nothing but superficial banality in the feelings and beliefs of others. Personal interactions, therefore, simply become aimless (and ineffective) discourse between two artificially constructed sets of values. Also contained in this charged passage are nuances of the British and Christian ideology that Mrs. Moore abandons, as well as references to the Hindu ideology that she cannot accept. The experience in the Caves forces Mrs. Moore to reject her two most sacred conceptions of value: the existence of spiritual absolutes and the idea of ​​interpersonal love. Of the former, Mrs. Moore finds that Christian principles, in some sense, are not adequate; his religious beliefs are based on the belief that God is always present as a physical force. But his central question reflects his sudden disillusionment: «and to us a Son is born, to us a Child is given… and I am good and he is bad and we are saved? and putting an end to all echo” (228). Even in the most fundamental and basic doctrines of Christianity, Ms. Moore now sees nothing but meaningless rhetoric. Christian dogma depends on the search for a divine presence; the prophecy of the Resurrection, for example, invokes a real physical reinvigoration of the Lord. Hinduism, on the other hand, emphasizes the absent aspect of God and finds transcendence only inintangible. However, Mrs. Moore cannot accept the possibility that absence implies presence. He understands that his lifelong concerns for personal salvation are futile and misdirected, but he can find no source of redemption in the formless, indefinable echo. Its religious ideology was founded solely on spiritual absolutes: the glorification of Jesus who was "born" and "given" to absolve man's sins, the guiding force of divine judgment, and a vigorous commitment to achieving salvation and avoiding damnation. Interestingly, as Mrs. Moore has aged, her commitment to these absolutes has strengthened; she found it "increasingly difficult to avoid" mentioning God's name (65). In a sense, she has come to India to find God manifested physically and is therefore shocked to discover that her relentless pursuit of his presence has been doomed from the start. (Suddenly, his seemingly profound statement in the mosque that "God is here" seems strikingly literal and painfully simplistic.) Realizing that the motivations and questions that have driven his life have been reflected and muted by the echo, Mrs. Moore repudiates Christianity. However, she cannot repudiate her ego and is thus left in a precarious limbo between her former self-centered principles and Hindu enlightenment. Stripped of a stable perspective and fully aware that time is running out, Mrs. Moore cannot find the inner strength to continue living or to save those she loves. The first two questions of the passage deal explicitly with Mrs. Moore's disillusioned renunciation of interpersonal relationships and, more generally, her rejection of love. Suddenly, Mrs. Moore's entire conception of personal interactions is transformed; there is truly no common bond between people, and human understanding exists as nothing more than a rhetorical myth. Love between family, in a "church", or in a "cave", exists purely as a construct that vanishes in the amoral and indiscriminate echo of the caves. Ms. Moore must accept a fundamental truth that guides the Hindu faith: love is more abstract, more intuitive, further from the desires of the individual than for the Christian. Love is not a derivative of the self, but an intangible force completely detached from the precise order of Western philosophy. Once again, the echoes convince Mrs. Moore that "Everything exists, nothing has value"; as a result, his concern for others shades into weary cynicism, impatience, and, finally, indifference (165). Suddenly, nothing connects her to Aziz, Adela or even Ronny: she cannot pass on her enlightenment to others because she cannot even accept it herself. In fact, the only thing Ms. Moore can do is mutter aloud various condemnations of Westernized thinking. In particular, his attacks focus on the idea of ​​"marriage" (or "church love"). Convinced that "the human race would have become one centuries ago if marriage had been useful," Ms. Moore seeks to convey the view that although men have practiced "carnal embrace" for centuries, they are nowhere near close to truly understanding each other. (224, 149). (This opinion, of course, is surprisingly accurate when placed in the broader context of Forster's fiction.) "Duty" and "confusion," mentioned in the stream-of-consciousness thoughts above, are directly linked to this idea of ​​fundamental misunderstanding in human interaction (228). Why believe in moral duty or waste your time loving another when it will ultimately end in needless frustration? If duty, marriage, or relationships were of “any use,” understandinguniversal would have produced a single consciousness, "one person". Achieving nirvana would involve deep human understanding, rather than the realization that the self exists only as a social construct and therefore meaningless. However, the question remains: Can Ms. Moore resolve these conflicting ideologies and find at least some form of redemption? Indeed, the echo that, ironically, silences everything that is proposed to her, destroys Mrs. Moore's values ​​and weakens her strength. She withdraws not only from the crisis that immediately presents itself, but also from life itself; she seems trapped in a spiritual death long before her physical death. It's no surprise, then, that she refuses to get involved in the Adela-Aziz fray; in fact, he treats the whole situation with disdain: "It was he in the cave and you in the cave and so on..." (228). Mrs. Moore struggles to put her twisted thoughts into words, but the meaning is clear: the events of that fateful day ultimately mean nothing in the bigger picture. Why should it matter, he implies, whether Adela was in the cave with Aziz or whether Adela was in the cave alone, the echo dissolves all questions of time, space, and even physical presence. This abrogation of time and space is a key element of Mrs. Moore's desperation. After struggling with questions of religious absolutes, social duty, and even personal obligation, she realized that the echo ends everything, including her unfulfilled life. Part of this final disillusionment involves his abdication of a previously rigid moral code. The echoes of the caves convince her that "everything exists" outside of a moral framework; nothing has “value” since morality cannot be attributed (165). Therefore, not only does Aziz's imprisonment have no moral repercussions, but Adela's lies are also muffled by the echoes. Mrs Moore, in fact, is fully aware of Aziz's innocence but the obligation to bear his moral burdens is intolerable. His previously firm beliefs melt into withered meekness and, finally, pedestrian death. But what about this death? Does Mrs. Moore ultimately matter as a character since her final thoughts (as in the passage above) are untranslated and therefore virtually meaningless? The irony, of course, is that Mrs. Moore is immortalized in the posthumous hollow-echo "Esmiss Esmoor" song that indirectly saves Aziz. Although he disavowed any involvement in the legal proceedings and even destroyed all ties to Aziz and Adela before his death, he still manages to play a crucial role in the trial; it is his influence that brings Adela back to reason and truth. He becomes the undefined and transcendent idol of the Indian people, a God-like figure who remains invisible and resistant to issues of time and space (much like Queen Victoria, who is treated with the same attributes at the beginning of the novel). Oddly, then, the Indians revere Mrs. Moore as a symbolic representation of human nirvana, an enlightenment that, in fact, she never even had the strength to pursue. Indeed, Mrs. Moore would certainly be horrified that her soul remained only in the form of a meaningless echo connecting the masses behind a cause she believed to be prosaic and unimportant. Ironically, he finally achieves the unity with the universe that he knew he was so passionate about. important even if superficially (and unconsciously). Thus, Mrs. Moore never resolves her own confusion and yet somehow manages to be a spiritual absolute to the people she ultimately abandoned. Forster's paradox, therefore, remains surprising and deeply frustrating. Mrs. Moore's questions never find one, 1984.