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The Celestial Omnibus and Other Stories

e.m. forster

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Eustace’s career – if career it can be called – certainly dates from that afternoon in the chestnut woods above Ravello. I confess at once that I am a plain, simple man, with no pretensions to literary style. Still, I do flatter myself that I can tell a story without exaggerating, and I have therefore decided to give an unbiased account of the extraordinary events of eight years ago. Ravello is a delightful place with a delightful little hotel in which we met some charming people. There were the two Miss Robinsons, who had been there for six weeks with Eustace, their nephew, then a boy of about fourteen. Mr. Sandbach had also been there some time. He had held a curacy in the north of England, which he had been compelled to resign on account of ill-health, and while he was recruiting at Ravello he had taken in hand Eustace’s education – which was then sadly deficient – and was endeavoring to fit him for one of our great public schools. Then there was Mr. Leyland, a would-be artist, and, finally, there was the nice landlady, Signora Scafetti, and the nice English-speaking waiter, Emmanuele – though at the time of which I am speaking Emmanuele was away, visiting a sick father.

172 pages, Paperback

First published January 1,1911

This edition

Format
172 pages, Paperback
Published
January 11, 2005 by Kessinger Publishing
ISBN
9781417908592
ASIN
1417908599
Language
English

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About the author

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e.m. forster

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Edward Morgan Forster, generally published as E.M. Forster, was an novelist, essayist, and short story writer. He is known best for his ironic and well-plotted novels examining class difference and hypocrisy in early 20th-century British society. His humanistic impulse toward understanding and sympathy may be aptly summed up in the epigraph to his 1910 novel Howards End: "Only connect".

He had five novels published in his lifetime, achieving his greatest success with A Passage to India (1924) which takes as its subject the relationship between East and West, seen through the lens of India in the later days of the British Raj.

Forster's views as a secular humanist are at the heart of his work, which often depicts the pursuit of personal connections in spite of the restrictions of contemporary society. He is noted for his use of symbolism as a technique in his novels, and he has been criticised for his attachment to mysticism. His other works include Where Angels Fear to Tread (1905), The Longest Journey (1907), A Room with a View (1908) and Maurice (1971), his posthumously published novel which tells of the coming of age of an explicitly gay male character.

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Rating(4 / 5.0, 100 votes)
5 stars
34(34%)
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32(32%)
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Mahir_Rahman
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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i'm actually reading Celestial Omnibus and Eternal Moment together in a collected volume ... i had no idea that E.M. Forster wrote stories of fantasy and science fiction, this is not an author i would have associated with the genre. Celestial Omnibus was written in, i believe, 1911 and the stories share themes of man's disconnect from nature, from sincerity and simplicity, and idealizes a classical past. they're charming and excellent.
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UniCiel
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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Middling collection of stories with all but the final one having some magical component. Certainly there is nothing here to rival Forster’s superlative short story The Machine Stops with its prescient themes of internet insularity. The Story of a Panic was probably my favourite.
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aypikillsu
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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I do not generally enjoy short stories as much as novels, but I LOVE these, especially the title story and "The Story of a Panic."
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poirotto
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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3.5 rounded down. A free read for Kindle from Amazon.

Forster certainly believes in telling the truth. At the end of one of these stories, he writes, "...I have been forced to use the unworthy medium of a narrative, and to delude you by declaring that this is a short story, suitable for reading in the train."

Or at the pool in this case.

And he could have predicted Goodreads! In a story about runners/walkers in a race, a runner sees someone running "for fun" and and doesn't understand. He says, "Every achievement is worthless unless it is a link in the chain of development." That is one reason why I'm reading E. M. Forster--to expand my boundaries, to try a writer I wasn't thrilled with in the past and of course, record it on Goodreads.

As you could figure from the title, most of these stories have an otherworldy mood to them. That's a great device for a writer because then you don't have to explain anything odd that happens.
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beradonna
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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Very fey. I love E.M. Forster. The title story was my favorite.
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Tarafaeryn
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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Perhaps a little less affected by Forster's life-altering epiphanies of nature as I was in my 20s, but still enjoyable. Makes me want to re-read Room with a View, a book I long ago cherished, to see if it holds up.
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Dreade
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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How very English. The Celestial Omnibus was the occasion to read this collection. It would resemble The Great Divorce, written by C.S. Lewis, of 1945. The Other Side of the Hedge and arguably The Road from Colonus have magic portals and are a nice bonus, though Derivative of Lewis Carroll. The Story of a Panic does not surpass Arthur Machen, but well worth it. Overall I am well charmed.
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