Maurice

Written between 1913 and 1914 but published posthumously in 1971, Maurice tells the story of a young Englishman coming to terms with his homosexuality in a society that criminalises and condemns it. Maurice Hall’s emotional life is shaped first by his attachment to Clive Durham, an intellectually cultivated fellow student, and later by his unexpected relationship with Alec Scudder, a gamekeeper. Their differing backgrounds bring the conventions of class and the restrictions of respectable English society into sharp relief.

Unlike many earlier literary treatments of same-sex desire, Forster’s novel dares to imagine the possibility of a life lived openly and happily. Its emotional directness is inseparable from its historical courage: the book was withheld from publication during the author’s lifetime because of the legal and social climate surrounding homosexuality. Tender, restrained and quietly defiant, Maurice occupies a distinctive place in the history of queer literature and in Forster’s exploration of individual freedom.