Howards End involves three strands of the British middle class as they were in the late Edwardian period. The Bast couple is from the lower end; the business-minded Wilcox family from the upper; half-German, half-English sisters Helen and Margaret Schlegel are from the intellectual bourgeoisie. The three groups come together by chance. The Schlegels first meet the Wilcox family at an hotel. The Basts come across the Schlegals when Helen accidentally takes Leonard Bast's umbrella leaving a music concert. Their stories become slowly intertwined until they are irremovably connected. Helen falls in and out of love with the youngest Wilcox son Paul; Margaret befriends mother Wilcox, Ruth; after Ruth's death she falls in love with father Wilcox, Henry, and marries him. It's like an early-Twentieth-Century soap - and there's the bad advice given by Henry to Leonard that costs the poor man his job, and the scandalous events that tie it all together.

But these things are plausible and understandable because of the way the novel is put together. Like a piece of clothing, small stitches in scraps of different people's lives end up making the finished item. And the characters feel real. They're not the flawless heroes of the romantic period, not the quintessential, horrid antagonists of the Victorians. None of these characters is necessarily dislikeable nor perfect. Margaret is appealing and a strong female even by today's standard; but she has flaws. Out of her context, her love for widowed Henry Wilcox can seem irritating - perhaps the writer intends that. And Henry shows genuine regret for what he's has done in the past - despite apparent apathy for everyone but himself - and has moments of complete goodness.

Perhaps what makes Howards End so interesting is the way it explores the topics of its time, subtly questioning prevailing views. It looks at class division, gender, imperial power, pre-World-War-One Anglo-German antagonism. It's a mirror to today's society too, with pertinent questions. And Christmas shopping seems just as arduous and pointless in the novel as it does a hundred years later.

It's also a perfect rainy-afternoon read. Some snags could bother today's reader: the love between Henry and Margaret - particularly after Henry's failure to carry out the old Mrs Wilcox's dying wishes - may feel too based in a male-dominated world, and might leave a bitter taste. But it's not a love story, and doesn't pretend to be. The impact of the novel lies in its real characters and their real emotions. As author EM Forster writes: 'Science explained people, but it could not understand them.' Clearly, he did.

(c) Melissa Rynn 2009

reviewed 19 March 2009 / London

NOTES - Howards End by EM Forster first published in 1910. In print and available from eg Waterstone, Amazon. A current edition is ISBN - 9781595476807, publisher - NuVision Publications, paperback 316 pages, date of publication - 23 May 2008.

Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2012

www.fringereport.com