Khazar university

Soames and Irene:

The novel primarily focuses on Soames and Irene Forsyte, the events around them, which directly influence the others‟ lives, generally two generations of the Forsytes. But the story begins with the engagement of June Forsyte. All the members of the Forsyte clan ga-thered at Old Jolyon‟s house, everything is chic, everybody dressed his/her best, and the au-thor describes everything accurately, from the side the Forsytes seem happy. June‟s engage-ment was a bit surprising, because her fiancé was not from their surrounding; he was an ordi-nary, architect. Soames and his wife Irene‟s relationship and their troubles emerged during this period, mainly the events happening lead the emerging of the core of the problems. Old Jolyon did not want his beloved granddaughter June to marry a man of no penny, but it was not his way to reject directly, so he gave a chance them. First he let them engage, and then put a task before Philip. He wanted Bosinney¹⁴ to prove himself and earn four hundred a year. As we know Soames was deeply devoted to his wife Irene, though Irene had a strong dislike to-wards him. In the hope of cooling his wife‟s sadness and unhappiness Soames decided to build a house outside London, at Robin Hills. So, this gave an opportunity to June and Philip Bosinney to show themselves to grandfather. June persuaded Soames let Bosinney to build an estate for Irene. This decision had changed all the generation of The Forsytes. Because after it unhappiness of Irene gave her alibi to betray her husband and have affair with Bosinney. Though the story does not go into details of what Bosinney and Irene‟s relations consisted, we can find out how they did spent time together and that they did have a deep affection for each-other. Upon Philip‟s death Irene left Soames to make her own life, which she could think to be happy and at least free of her unhappy marriage. It was 10 or 12 years however before they finally divorced.

Transformation in Irene emerged with position of life and with dominating character of forsytism. As the evolution in her position grew gradually those who admired her even doesn‟t notice it. That‟s natural, because her story presents an independent aesthetic interest by itself. But significance of her behaviours and worries are greater than could be imagined, seeing her tragedy and the solution of conflict.

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14. 
    June‟s fiancé
    

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Irene jealousy, her behaviour and reaction in those days, when the fate of her son was in the case of solution was contrary towards the feelings, which caught Fleur and John. So this contrast in its turn gave a sharp dramatic view to the scene.

Why psychological conflict is described with the main characters – Soames and Irene and “The Forsyte Saga” begins with the engagement of Bosinney, which then became the be-ginning of the ending of an unhappy marriage of Irene. The secret of the novelist is disclosed very easily: If not this sudden love, Irene could not dare to divorce with Soames, could not understand how her marriage was like slavery. It is seen that the author thought better to be-gin from a rotary point when Irene guessed the impossibility of living with the old ways. Neither Galsworthy, no Irene proclaims it openly. Everything is understood from the spiritual changing of Irene and the cruelty of Soames. He was obliged to agree with the coming of Bo-sinney to his home and the meetings of Irene with an architect at different places. Meetings and love were not secret; the lovers did not conceal their feelings. The author choosing a spe-cial manner of describing of happenings prefers to lead the reader to the world of Irene‟s feelings indirectly using his right to penetrate to their inner world for recognition of his cha-racter. About the closeness of Irene with Bosinney first of all knew Young Jolyon.

Then, after the death of Bosinney the former shape of Irene transfers into a new situa-tion, when her protector and also the second husband became Young Jolyon. This is in it race a compositional relation of the novels “The Man of Property” and “In Chancery”. In the first novel the psychological conditional of Irene was found and showed from the side of an archi-tect and in the second it became remembrance, shape, living in the imagination of a loving person.

But thinking about the conflict flow, you can forget about these relations, the exis-tence of monotonous Forsytes standards, for a while, and concentrate on that saturated inner life of Irene, enthusiasm to love, fear, power of will and weakness, opposed to “The Man of Property” and then in “In Chancery”. The author tried to draw attention on that how Irene, waiting for Bosinney-beautiful out of will figure- differed from that one who get informed about the death of a lover, her smart face immediately flushing with crazy hopes and again fixed on sorrow. How expressive appearance, so many shades of inner world there were.

Nothing could keep her from closeness with Bosinney – neither the fact that she was a wife of another person, nor the gossips of Forsytes. From the other side, the world sur-rounding her was very cruel. It was impossible not to notice that in the eyes of Soames‟ rela-tives Irene was still the wife of him, not deserving, disobedient but still the wife of Forsytes.

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Twelve years passed and again she heard from Soames that, he wanted her to return. She didn‟t have any information about the talks between her mother and Soames. But again she rejected him with the same irreconcilable way as previous time. The Forsyte should ac-cept and understand his defeat. But Soames as usual thought that, he was a good husband, wanted only the best things for Irene. And if the was such a problem with Irene, the reason was the love between Bosinney and Irene and now Bosinney died, and there could not be obstinacy to reject him. So, hearing the negative answer from Irene he again began to suspect of her new relation. So, it was not clear enough for him that the problem was not any kind of relation, the real root of the mother was the deep hollow between them, which will never let them be together. So, before remarrying Young Jolyon, Irene decided to cut all the ties with Soames. But the thought of Soames is directed to another side. According to his mind the fact that Irene didn‟t love him couldn‟t be the reason of their divorce, because he loved her and very much, so it could be enough for both. Additionally he was such a good husband that, he could forgive her blame and betrayal as is seen the impingement of Beauty became quite sen-sitive for Forsytes. Forgetting about the previous incident in the family in which love won the possessive world, they again continued to observe and value Irene as a stupid person. Once Young Jolyon didn‟t agree with his father and all other Forsytes married a woman of having less property. He was rejected by his family. Old Jolyon took June, his son‟s daughter of from the first marriage and no one wanted to know anything about Jolyon, who worked as a clerk, lived a modest life without property and also was busy with art which was not a business for Forsytes. Old Jolyon who broke up all the ties with his son, many years after began to destroy the fences separating him from his son and had done it resolutely.

In the Forsyte family the rules were as in the finance world: behavior of the family members were counted according to their personal interests. All the rest were thrown away as a useless thing. It was such about the Irene‟s feelings, which were so unimportant for For-sytes. It was such with the fate of Young Jolyon who also wanted to have a family with love. But Irene‟s behaviours caused more rough reproach than the second marriage of young Jolyon. He was the object of gossips, all the Forsytes spoke about him only bad words and he became unimportant figure in the clan, but no one openly strived against him, just he was re-jected by all relatives. But Irene was another case. Neither Soames, nor other members of the clan could compromise her and not to judge about her behaviour because she didn‟t obey their rules. Not they turned her out, but she couldn‟t bare that kind of life and left them, in general the world of Forsytes. For this reason she was judged by all of the clan. Soames‟s aunts who valued him very much tried to blame her in everything. Because they had for it a lot of evi-

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dences, as Soames was a man of family. He lived only for a family, didn‟t have a lot of friends and also he had good hand in business. He tried to protect the interests of Forsytes in the business sphere when they had any problem.

But even Irene – the person, who strived in her inner world for the Beauty and Freedom for years, has lost her ideas which flushed in her during youth. Years have taken her outer and inner beauty. Her golden hair has lost its freshness, but the main problem is that, her ability to value the personal freedom, to protect the rights of truth rather than the man of property has been lost.

The central line of the plot is the Family Tragedy of Soames Forsyte, the son of James, and cousin of old Jolyon. Soames always tries to hide his family problems from the people around him, but destruction of his family is inescapable. The Forsyte accept his wife as an extraordinary person in their circle. As Galsworthy describes, “with golden hair and dark eyes she looks like a Goddess”, she is very attractive and charming and differs with her delicate taste. After her father‟s death, who was a professor, a young girl was alone, and was obliged to marry Soames, who was begging her to marry him nearly half a year. She marries without love, resting on the promises of her fiancé that in the case of unlucky marriage she‟ll get free-dom, and no one can force her to stay with him. Right from the beginning Irene understood what a terrible mess she had done, which became the cause both for her and Soames. She didn‟t only love him, but also had hatred towards him. At first, she tried to force her, but with the time this disgust became unbearable. She was oppressed by the tedious life around her, where she was given a role of a beautiful thing s if she was a decoration or jewelry of her husband, possession of which gave him self confidence of having property.

Soames loves her as himself, but this is a kind of ownership love and he always suffers from jealousy. So in the ball at uncle Rodger‟s, he was looking fixedly and irritatingly how his wife was dancing with other men, but he didn‟t dance with her, because in that period in their circle to dance with own wife was unpopular. He really left Irene alone in society, even when objective problems separated them; he followed her with eyes in which was boredom and worry. Soames always bought Irene lots of decorative things, jewelry, beautiful dresses, but it again was for the reason to show people that her wife is the most beautiful and she is best dressed. He doesn‟t realize that it is not enough for woman to be happy, because there is not an inner relation between them. Her passiveness and silent appearance teases him, and with the time it grows to madness. He couldn‟t understand Irene‟s behaviour towards him, because he isn‟t a drunker, he doesn‟t owe money, play cards, he is not a rude person, and he doesn‟t have illegal relations and always tries to spend his time at home.

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Being successful at his work Soames entrusts the building of his new house in the suburb of London, at Robin Hill to Philip Bosinney. But he is worried about the sincere rela-tion growing day by day between his wife and the young architect which is seemed to turn to a deep mutual feeling. Irene tries to speak about divorce, but it is useless, because Soames does not want even to listen to such ideas of Irene, he thinks that these are nonsense, and just she has a wrong idea about the responsibilities of woman at home, as a wife. Four years ago Soames was caught by the beauty and charm of Irene and he cannot accept the loss of what has been gained. These complicated relations are the object of rumor and gossip among the Forsytes. At first they say that Irene was not agreeing with her marriage, and then the gossips were about that she “wants to have a separate room”. She is getting detached from Soames day by day, at last she refuses to fulfill her “family responsibilities” and closes the door of her bedroom to Soames. Irene was determined to leave her husband. But Soames could not ac-cept anyway her departure. In those times Bosinney died in a car accident. So Irene obliged to return home, but not forever, cause to live together with Soames was nearly deadly torture for her. So after a while she leaves the home, but this time forever.

There are so many complications, multilateral characters in this novel that, but gene-rally Soames is a central figure of the two trilogies. The author gave the description of this character from inner and outer side, with the eyes of friends and enemies, with his own ideas, ways of thinking and behaviour, with his treatment towards family, marriage, marital rela-tions, also with his attitude to business world, society which he lives in, art, historical and po-litical matters. He is quite a smart person, but he is limited by the thoughts which are really very strict in his surrounding, clan, he is a typical conservative person, bourgeois man. Being clever and talented by nature he put all his efforts hoarding and gathering money. Though he is of upper class society and he should have friends of his class and enjoy the life, he did not like such a life, there is not any desire in him to have friendships, enjoy parties, etc. His only thinking is Irene, unfortunately who does not care for Soames and always escapes closeness with him, which makes her out of reach and remote. His character of being “a man of pro-perty” prevails his good and mankind features, interferes with revealing of the good sides of his personality. First of all he is irreplaceable in the business sphere and relations and this pro-fessional honesty is due to his ability of keeping himself from risking. With such characters, with so many pluses Soames married a girl of lower clan which really happened rarely, and was shocking, but he has done it, because he loved Irene without anything, though this love was a kind of “property love”. She worthies more things for him, but there is not closeness and sincerity between them.

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Soames feeling of property influences his life wholly, and generally he never com-promised anything for his love and did not do extra thing to attract Irene‟s attention; when bought portraits he calculated it for resale so it was a way of business and Irene also was a kind of property for him, she was a very beautiful, charming thing like a diamond or another jewelry for him, he liked to decorate her and show publicly that he has such a beautiful, love-ly, alive property. He can‟t even imagine that a woman can have her own point of view, likes, dislikes, her own will, and for her happiness she needs moral stability and spiritual relation with him. He tries to limit and govern life and pleasures, etc. He wants to see her just as he wishes. Always with smile, always charming, chic, dressing her bests, which bought by him to make her delicate for him. So, she had to be cute not for herself, but for him, because she was “a property” for him. So, his clan, his surrounding, his point of view interferes with common sense of love, he can‟t understand that love and beauty should base on liberty. If a person is not free he/she cannot enjoy love or beauty, because each has his/her own thoughts of love and beauty, they are quite subjective to argue; so Soames‟s “property love” could not satisfy and give pleasure to Irene.

Soames Forsyte is a failure; he could not succeed both in family and in business. He failed as a human and also as a Forsyte. As a human he could not realize the importance of relations between man and woman, the intimate relations in the family, as a Forsyte he is a failure, because he could not keep his capital and sunk it. ”Artistic, sexual and emotional pos-sibilities beyond his own experience”. (21, p.56)

Irene was a kind of woman who was admired by everyone with her beauty and charm. But her inner world was not revealed because she did not disclose herself, she is just por-trayed as a beauty “Her identify remains the hermeneutic space at the centre of Galsworthy‟s novel”. (21, p.57) Only when she befriended with old Jolyon, she could put forward her own consciousness. She speaks not keeps silent:

“That night I went to the Embankment; a woman caught me by the dress. She told me about herself. When one knows what others suffer, one‟s ashamed”. “One of those?” She nodded and horror stirred within old Jolyon, the horror of one who has never known a struggle with depression”. (27, p. 337)

From the very beginning Soames‟s and Irene‟s relation was described in somehow strange. As a husband and wife their courteous scenes were not exciting. It also may be sign to the following situations by the author. “It had been one of those real devoted wooings which books and people praise, when the lover is at length rewarded for hammering the iron till it is malleable, and all must be happy ever after…” (14, p.50)

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Soames is a Forsyte, but he is not a devil, he is just a man who has no feelings. And it makes him disgusting and unbearable. If a woman of humanistic views wants to live together with him, she would make her eyes blind and her ears deaf. Thus the topics of their talks would be only about money and money making. So his behaviors and treatments, his expecta-tions from the spouse are quite predictable. “He could not understand what she found wrong with him. It was not as if he drank! Did he run into dept, or gamble, or swear; was he violent; were his friends rackety; did he stay out at night?” (14, p.49)

Soames is an object of humour, in one side, because he never thinks himself guilty. According to his view he is an ideal man and husband, and Irene should appreciate and esti-mate such a husband. His limitations are not problem for him. He wants to get both the body and the soul of his wife. And for him it is quite a normal phenomenon. “Soames ... expe-rienced a sense of exasperation amounting to pain, that he did not own her as it was his right to own her, that he could not, as by stretching out his hand to that rose, pluck her and sniff the very secrets of her heart”. (14, p.61)

Galsworthy‟s Soames Forsyte is a very complex character. He is a very brutal person, he never understands his wife, but he is also polite one, never hurt people, tries to be gentle to women, he buys everything for his wife, he wants to see his wife completely beautiful, and gives everything for it. He is powerful, because he has property, he attained the woman who he admired, but he is week, because he couldn‟t keep her. Though he has so much property, he power his power couldn‟t save his family.

Galsworthy‟s makes his reader to have a pity toward Soames deep in heart. He is a man who is abandoned by his wife. So, the reader can think that, may be Irene treats very cruelly, and she has no feeling, she is as cold as stone. It is painful for Soames, but he tries to conceal his grief. Irene does not give a good night kiss to her husband, maybe she is really is not a good wife, and it is Irene who is guilty in this parting. If something hurts Soames heart, he is a human, and he is mankind. So, why does Irene treat so roughly with his heart? But in fact, it is not such, and Irene just could not show her inner world, her humanistic ideas, which had no importance for Soames.

In the first chapter Soames is described very polite, and he was a beloved person of his Aunt Ann. Soames was even described more interesting than Young Jolyon.

Actually, the writer had problem with Young Jolyon. He was one of the character‟s who had something to do with Art and Beauty. Other characters were Irene and Bosinney. Galsworthy‟s problem with this characters is that they are humanistic, and they are few; so the author himself was included to this few people of the society. Thus, in the background of the

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novel there is a hidden war towards Forsytes. As Bosinneys, Irenes, and Galsworthy were few, this war continued secretly. The writer describes Forsytes property with a delineated taste. It is not only for reading and enjoying good words. Here we can find his point of attack. He wants to reveal the Forsytes world. Boasting with the horses, houses, drink, furniture they open the inner side of their aristocracy.