Edward Morgan Forster OM CH (1 January 1879 – 7 June 1970) was an English author. He is best known for his novels, particularly A Room with a View (1908), Howards End (1910) and A Passage to India (1924). He also wrote numerous short stories, essays, speeches and broadcasts, as well as biographies and pageant plays. His short story "The Machine Stops" (1909) is often viewed as the beginning of technological dystopian fiction. He also co-authored the libretto to Benjamin Britten's opera Billy Budd (1951). Many of his novels examine class differences and hypocrisy. His views as a humanist are at the heart of his work.