Aspects of the Novel · Chapter
VIII: Pattern and Rhythm explained
Forster returns to the main scheme of the lectures, introducing pattern (borrowed from painting) and rhythm (borrowed from music) as aesthetic aspects of fiction that spring from plot and characters.
What happens
Forster returns to the main scheme of the lectures, introducing pattern (borrowed from painting) and rhythm (borrowed from music) as aesthetic aspects of fiction that spring from plot and characters. He illustrates pattern with two examples: Anatole France's 'Thaïs', shaped like an hourglass, and Percy Lubbock's 'Roman Pictures', shaped like a grand chain. He then discusses rhythm, first in the easy sense of repetition plus variation, exemplified by Proust's use of Vinteuil's little phrase, and then in the more difficult sense of a whole work's rhythmic unity, as in a symphony. He concludes that while pattern provides external form, rhythm stitches a book together internally and opens it out rather than rounding it off.
Themes in this chapter
Art, Pattern, and Rhythm
Forster defines pattern and rhythm as aesthetic aspects of fiction, borrowing from painting and music to describe how novels achieve beauty and unity.
The Nature of Storytelling
The chapter explores how pattern and rhythm function alongside story and plot to create a holistic reading experience.
Characters to notice
- Paphnuce
Ascetic who saves Thaïs but is damned by the encounter; central to the hourglass pattern.
- Thaïs
Courtesan saved by Paphnuce; her trajectory crosses his in the hourglass pattern.
- Mr. Percy Lubbock
Author of 'Roman Pictures', used to illustrate the grand chain pattern.
- Marcel Proust
His use of Vinteuil's little phrase exemplifies rhythm in fiction.
- Swann
Hears Vinteuil's little phrase during his love for Odette and later in jealousy.
- Vinteuil
Composer of the little phrase; his music stitches Proust's book together.
Key passages
“We will borrow from painting first and call it the pattern. Later we will borrow from music and call it rhythm.”
Forster introduces two new concepts for analyzing fiction: pattern, taken from painting, and rhythm, taken from music.
This sets up the chapter's framework for discussing aesthetic form in novels.
“Thaïs, by Anatole France, is the shape of an hourglass.”
The novel 'Thaïs' has a symmetrical structure where the two main characters converge and then diverge, like an hourglass.
This is Forster's first example of pattern in fiction.
“Roman Pictures is a social comedy. The narrator is a tourist in Rome; he there meets a kindly and shoddy friend of his, Deering...”
In 'Roman Pictures', the pattern is like a grand chain dance, where characters are passed from one to another and eventually return to the starting point.
This is Forster's second example of pattern, illustrating a circular structure.
“The little phrase of Vinteuil... is almost an actor, but not quite, and that 'not quite' means that its power has gone towards stitching Proust's book together from the inside.”
Vinteuil's musical phrase recurs throughout Proust's novel, not as a character but as a rhythmic device that internally binds the work.
Forster uses this to explain rhythm as repetition plus variation that creates unity.
“Expansion. That is the idea the novelist must cling to. Not completion. Not rounding off but opening out.”
Forster argues that the novel should aim for expansion and liberation of its elements, like a symphony, rather than neat closure.
This concludes the chapter's exploration of rhythm as a means to achieve a larger, open-ended beauty.
