- Marabar Caves
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The Marabar Caves are fictional caves in the novel A Passage to India and the film of the same name. The caves are based on the real life Barabar Caves located in the Jehanabad District of Bihar, India. They serve as an important plot location and motif in the novel. Key features of the caves are the glass smooth walls and a peculiar resonant echo magnifying any sound made in the caves.
Among many others, the main characters; Mrs. Moore, Adela Quested, and Dr. Aziz take a trip to the Marabar Caves. During the tour of the caves Adela, Dr. Aziz and a local guide carry on separate from the group. Adela is conflicted about her engagement to Ronny, Chief Magistrate of Chandrapore. She questions her ability to love anyone and of the difficulties of becoming a wife, let alone the wife of a British Civil Magistrate in a foreign country. Assuming Dr. Aziz, as a Muslim, has many wives, she questions him about them. Rattled by the question (his only wife had died, leaving two sons), Dr. Aziz dives into the entrance of the nearest cave for a cigarette. Adela enters another cave, someone else also enters after her and between the echo and her confused state of mind she feels she has been attacked, and flees the caves through a dangerous route down a steep incline and through poisonous plants. Coincidentally, a fellow Englishwoman is there with a car and swiftly returns Adela to Chandrapore where she lodges a charge of molestation against Dr. Aziz. A trial ensues which is central to the novel's development of the cultural biases and conflicts during the British occupation of India.
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