Mr. Fielding: The Problematic Liberal Colonizer

In the novel, Mr. Fielding is quite often associated with ‘mistakes’ that need to be later ‘covered up’ for. In his character as a liberal colonizer, he seems to be hardly either if the words are taken separately. From the start, Mr. Fielding is shown to be most comfortable when he does not have to choose a side, his humanism then in some way is more exilic than freeing especially when he believes that ‘India is a muddle’ and eventually remaining neutral in a land that is socially categorical, he fails as both a liberal and a colonizer. However, in the course of the novel, Mr. Fielding is by far the most accommodating of the Indians who are generally referred to as ‘slack’ and ‘obscure’.

Mr. Fielding is perhaps most reflective of the narrator himself. As the principal, the narrator has been very generous in portraying him as someone who could bestow ‘kindness, more kindness and even after that more kindness’, something that is very casually, and candidly demanded off Fielding by Aziz. Fielding’s constant strive to maintain middle ground is somehow problematic. He does feel close to Aziz, yet fails to understand Aziz’s words. His later thoughts summarize confusion, doubt and crisis. “Kindness, kindness, and more kindness – yes, that he might supply but is that really all the queer nation needed? ... What had he done to deserve this outburst of confidence and what hostage could he give in exchange?’  As a humanist who earlier mentions he’s not part of the ‘herd’ and that he ‘was happy in the give and take of private conversation’ one can imagine why his identity is so very mature in a land that is contriving between the old Englishmen and the Indians. The one thing that the character of Fielding poses is the description of either side from his point of view. Not being a ‘pukka’ and a ‘sahib’ is largely how we are able to see what Englishwomen in India were desirous of and how far labels went to maintain colonial superiority. In his own frankness, we also see the rigidity of people like Ronnie who find it duty to corner him when seen smoking with Adela who says ‘I’m a sun dried bureaucrat, no doubt; still I don’t like to see an English girl left smoking with two Indians’ to which Fielding curtly and confidently replies ‘I really can’t see the harm’. This juxtaposition of the English against Fielding does not make him any closer to being Indian - only really ‘un- situates’ him in the land. Being very much English in his manners still, Fielding is more liberal because he chooses to remain silent at instances when the ‘pukkas’ would have shown the Indians their place. This is evident after Aziz’s remarks about Adela to which he just smiled but ‘found a touch of bad taste in the reference to a lady’s breasts’.

Mr. Fielding represents the problematic existence of liberal colonials. He ‘travels light’ and while many Indians do too they like Aziz are ‘nevertheless placed, very placed’. He is a ‘holy man, minus the holiness’ and Aziz was ‘rooted in society and Islam’. He goes so far to wish for unity but fails only because his ‘unconventional’ existence is unacceptable in India where the subject –colonizer relationship is fairly clear. And therefore, like Aziz says, Mr. Fielding is ‘warm hearted and unconventional, but not what can be called wise’