![]() ![]() The world, she sees, needs the Wilcox brand of self-belief and energy, just as much as it needs her own and Helen’s gentler, more overtly cultured, self-awareness. The busy, manly Wilcoxes, so focused on outward appearances, their lives full of ‘telegrams and anger’, may seem like the ones doing all the harm, but they have much to offer too, as the Schlegel sisters realise, Margaret in particular. Such simple ingredients, such a magnificent concoction small wonder that by the second page my sixteen-year-old attitude had shifted from a lazy interest to something more akin to awe.Īnd Forster was so good at being right too! Not just about big tangible things like the pollutant threats of modern life (motor cars, sprawling towns etc) to the tranquillity of the English countryside and the lives of those occupying it, but also about the much more subtle business of society needing those very same things in order to thrive. ![]() But as I came to see, the real ingenuity lay in how Forster had woven all those component parts together, binding them with his trademark, effortless imagery and a page-turner of a story that still makes me laugh out loud just as often as I reach for the Kleenex. My A level copy of the book is trampled with biro, most of it simply marvelling at the sanity, the wisdom, the humour, the breathtaking perceptions, rather than offering any helpful pointers towards constructing a well-argued essay. I had read great narratives and I had read worthy sentiments, but it wasn’t until Howards End that I experienced the power emanating from a perfect fusion of the two. No, what engaged me from that memorable opening line – ‘One may as well begin with Helen’s letters to her sister’ – was Forster’s story and the truths that rang out from it. And I certainly entertained no private passion for E M Forster, who was famously gay and somewhat forlorn and even a little seedy when it came to his own quests for fulfilment beyond the business of writing. You could say (at the risk of even greater corn) that I fell in love….not with the Schlegel sisters themselves of course, or poor Leonard Bast, or the Wilcoxes (ballsy and noisy apart from the first, elusive, mystical Mrs Wilcox,) or even the beautiful, spiritually-infused bricks and mortar of Howards End itself. I had got through a good many novels by then too – stuff like Dickens and Hardy (O level syllabus) and anything off my parents’ shelves that looked promisingly racy (Nabokov, Murdoch, Amis) – but Howards End was the first book which utterly, totally, from the first word to the very last, STOLE MY HEART. Studying Shakespeare and Edward Albee in the classroom, my hand was always first up in the hope of being selected to read a part. ![]() I had even been toying with the idea of becoming an actress. Reading stories, grappling with ideas rather than facts – as a subject it had been a no-brainer when choosing what to pursue in the sixth form. I nonetheless lay this claim at the foot of E M Forster’s Howards End, recognised as a classic from the instant of its publication in 1910 and falling onto my desk in 1977, thanks to its selection on the curriculum for A level English. Leave comments and I will update.It’s corny to say a book changed your life and also, perhaps, a little hard to believe when the book concerned is not at first glance an epic firework of a thing, but a gentle, humorous, beautifully told story of two middle class families in England shortly after the turn of the century. Here's a list of eponyms and examples of eponyms. You actually want a Tissue but Kimberly-Clark did a great job getting us to call it Kleenex instead. You know like when you say I want a Kleenex. There are so many products where the name of it is what the market calls it. Last updated on My Free Marketing newsletter □ ![]() The Ultimate List of Eponyms Examples: Brands that OWN the Market ![]()
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