A Passage to India: Part 2, Chapter 27 Summary & Analysis

It is late that same night, and most of the partiers at Aziz’s victory celebration are asleep on the Nawab Bahadur’s roof. Fielding and Aziz talk sleepily, lying side by side on the roof and looking at the stars. Aziz wants to travel with Fielding, and promises to pay for everything once he gets his money from Adela. Fielding starts to talk, but Aziz cuts him off, knowing what he will say—that Aziz should not make Adela pay anything more than the legal costs. Aziz says that he no longer cares what the English think of him, though, so he doesn’t need to impress them by being chivalrous. He says he has become “anti-British” now.

Aziz then changes the subject, and for a while they enjoy the “blessings of leisure,” something which is unfamiliar to Western culture. Fielding is dressed in Indian clothes, but he knows he will always feel awkward and out of place in them compared to the graceful Indians. After a while Fielding presses on and does advise Aziz to not make Adela pay reparations. He says that he understands her better now, and sees that she acted bravely in going against the strong influence of her English compatriots. He requests that Aziz be merciful.

Aziz says he can’t be merciful until he receives an apology, and then he mocks Adela for her ugliness. Fielding cuts off the conversation, saying that Aziz’s sexual snobbery is the one thing about he “can’t put up with.” After a long silence Aziz says that he will consult with Mrs. Moore, and then do whatever she advises regarding Adela. He praises Mrs. Moore extravagantly, again saying that she is a true “Oriental.”

Fielding points out that Aziz’s emotions are not “in proportion to their objects”—Aziz praises and loves Mrs. Moore, who never really did anything tangible to help him, but he hates Adela, who actually saved him. Aziz criticizes Fielding’s rational approach to emotion, comparing feelings to a sack of potatoes, measuring love out by the pound. He doesn’t understand Fielding’s materialism, while Fielding doesn’t understand Aziz’s unfairness.

Aziz’s time in prison has made him less flighty and more strong-willed, and he presses on in the conversation, wanting to talk more about Mrs. Moore. Finally Fielding cannot put up with the lie anymore, and he tells Aziz that Mrs. Moore has died. Hamidullah overhears him, though, and quickly interrupts to say that Fielding is joking. Aziz believes Hamidullah. Fielding doesn’t press the issue, but muses on how a person isn’t truly dead until they are “felt to be dead.” In this way Mrs. Moore has escaped death somehow, because her death is not really felt or believed. Eventually the men fall asleep.