Henry James Archives - Page 5 of 15

In the Cage

April 30, 2013 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

In the Cage first appeared in book form in both England and America in 1898. It was later revised and included in the complete New York edition of James’s work in 1909. The tale is quite unusual in James’s oeuvre in that it takes its subject matter from the daily life of a working-class woman. The milieu is also novel, because the events of the narrative are set in one corner of a grocer’s shop – albeit located in Mayfair.

In the Cage – critical commentary

Story? Novella? Novel?

At almost thirty-three thousand words, In the Cage is too long to be classed as a short story. It strays beyond the limits of this genre both in terms of length and subject matter. Of course James never claimed that any of his shorter fictions were short stories in the sense that this term is now used. The collective title he used for his shorter works was Tales – which turned out to be very well chosen, since this term does not carry any fixed expectations in terms of form or content.

The issue of categorisation depends very much on the interpretation given to the content of the piece. If it is regarded as an innocent and brief interlude during the summer months of a young woman’s life, it would be quite legitimate to classify it as a long short-story. She indulges in an imaginative romance, but then settles for a safe if predictable marriage.

But if the issues of modern telegraphy, transmitting messages, the different expectations and behaviour between working and liesured classes, and the educative process of the young woman’s lesson in realism are taken into account – a case could be made for it being a short novel. These are large enough issues to warrant classification in the heavier and more serious genre.

However, in even a short novel we would normally expect a more even-handed and fully rounded account of the principal characters. In the Cage provides characterisation for only the young woman, her friend Mrs Jordan, and her fiancé Mr Mudge. We really know very little about Captain Everard and almost nothing about Lady Bradeen except through the imagination of the young woman or the social gossip of Mrs Jordan. This is not the substance we expect of the realist novel, no matter how foreshortened.

That leaves the possibility of classifying the work as a novella. The tale certainly has a number of the ingredients we expect to find in the genre that James particularly admired – what he called “the beautiful and blessed nouvelle“. . Novellas are like simplified and densely compressed novels, with few characters and an intensely concentrated subject which usually has universal significance.

Narrative interest in this tale is focussed on the educative experience of one character – the young woman telegraphist. The location (apart from one brief holiday excursion) is largely her commercial environment in Mayfair and the pressure she is under from social conditions at work and home. Her professional skills working with contemporary technology are a fitting symbol for communications between the classes which form the backbone to the narrative. And it could be argued that her final decision to realistically accept her fate as the wife-to-be of a grocer is a universal theme.

On all these grounds In the Cage qualifies as a novella. But there are some problems with this interpretation which fits the tale to this genre.

Problems

Foremost is the issue of inevitability. The novella (and even the novel) does require a certain degree of persuadable, logical, inevitable outcome from the premises it has laid forward. It also has to be said that most novellas have a very serious, and often a tragic outcome: one thinks of classics in the genre, such as Benito Cereno, Death in Venice, and even James’s own The Turn of the Screw, which was written in the same year.

The problem with In the Cage is that the young lady, for the majority of the narrative, is a hopelessly romantic fantasist – imputing all sorts of characteristics and motives to her customers without any supporting intelligence. James deliberately satirises this attitude, as he does the comparable snobbery and pretention of Mrs Jordan. What he does not really supply is sufficient evidence for her change of heart when she decides to settle for marriage to Mr Mudge.

Quite apart from his semi-comic name, Mr Mudge has been characterised throughout the tale as a well-intentioned man but a monumental bore of Dickensian proportions. He represents a realistic marriage prospect for a young woman of the telegraphist’s position in society – but since we have been made aware of his shortcomings largely from her point of view throughout the narrative, her conversion to accepting him at its end doesn’t seem altogether persuasive. Neither is such a resolution the substance of the novella, which normally deals in serious issues. The future for Mr and Mrs Mudge in Chalk Farm is nothing more than the prospect of a life of unremitting Pooterism, The Diary of a Nobody having been published only a few years earlier in 1888). This sort of bathetic outcome is not normally the substance of a novella.

On these grounds, it might be safer to simply leave In the Cage categorised as the completely amorphous Tale, a long story of sorts (which is more or less the same thing), or a very short novel. It is interesting to note that it is placed in all these categories by members of the book trade such as Amazon and AbeBooks.

In the Cage – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1892—1898 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 18—18 – Library of America – Amazon US

In the Cage – Kindle edition

In the Cage – eBook versions at Gutenberg

In the Cage – audioBook versions at LibriVox

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

In the Cage – plot summary

Part I. An un-named young woman works as a telegraphist in the post office within a grocer’s store in Mayfair. She has become engaged (without much enthusiasm) to Mr Mudge, a grocer, and she lives in rather poor circumstances with her mother and her elder sister.

Part II. Her fiancé wants her to move to an ‘outer suburb’ (Chalk Farm) so as to be nearer to him, and to save money. But she prefers to stay in Mayfair, the social life of which gives her scope for her imagination.

Part III. She despatches telegrams and cryptic messages, and she fantasises about the lives of her customers – particularly a ‘handsome lady’ who might be called Mary or Cissie.

Part IV. She interprets the lives of her customers from the contents of their telegrams – particularly a man who comes in with the handsome lady, who she assumes to be the ‘Everard’ mentioned in some messages.

Part V. She is very conscious of class differences and the profligate way her (largely upper-class) customers spend their money (judging by the length of their messages – which are priced per word). She feels powerful in knowing people’s secrets and she generalizes that her women customers are on the whole in pursuit of her men.

Part VI. Her friend Mrs Jordan invites her to join her flower-arranging enterprise, which she enjoys because it brings her into contact with upper class society.

Part VII. She is tempted by the idea, because she wants to meet people from the upper class. Mrs Jordan claims to be on intimate terms with her clients, but it is clear that she is exaggerating any such connections.

Part VIII. The two women begin to compete over who has the closer connections with fashionable society. The young woman also begins to have doubts about her engagement to Mr Mudge.

Part IX. She has mixed feelings about Mr Mudge, who is boring and predictable, yet she respects his simplicity and honesty. She can see his limitations, and she aspires to ‘greater’ (more romantic) things.

Part X. She tells Mr Mudge that she is appalled by the rich people who are her customers, but it is clear that she feels a snobbish pleasure at ‘mixing’ with upper class society. He too is attracted to the idea of rubbing shoulders with the well-to-do.

Part XI. Meanwhile,, she continues to inflate the significance of her (non) ‘relationship’ with Captain Everard. She invents excuses for querying his written notes, but sees them as having been planted there deliberately for that purpose.

Part XII. She imagines that Captain Everard would like to share his problems with her and confide in her about his love affairs. She goes to the building at Park Chambers where he lives and fantasises about meeting him.

Part XIII. The handsome lady returns, and she helps her to correct a mistake in her telegram, which reveals her knowledge of the lady’s affairs.

Part XIV. When the summer arrives Mr Mudge wants to plan a holiday together. She is bored by the excessive details of his preparation, and starts walking past Park Chambers every night. On one occasion she does meet him there.

Part XV. They walk into Hyde Park and sit on a bench together, talking. He reveals that he knows she has been taking a ‘special interest’ in him, which makes her cry.

Part XVI. Thinking that she is unlikely to meet him again, she tells him the whole truth of the interest she has taken in him, but that she will be leaving to work elsewhere. He asks her to stay and ‘help’ him.

Part XVII. She admits to him that she enjoys knowing about people’s private lives and says she will do anything for hi. He implores with her to stay working in the post office, and she leaves him saying that she will never give him up.

Part XVIII. She goes on holiday to Bournemouth with her mother and Mr Mudge, where he is more boring than ever, but she retreats from him into a private world of the imagination. However, he announces that having been given a rise at work, he is now ready to marry.

Part XIX. She relates her recent experiences in the Park with Captain Everard to Mr Mudge, and explains how she wants to protect him from danger. She also wants Mr Mudge to wait longer before they marry – at which Mudge is (understandably) miffed.

Part XX. Some weeks later Captain Everard returns to the post office. She feels that something is wrong, and possibly reaching a dramatic climax. Everard lingers in the shop, but they do not get a chance to speak to each other.

Part XXI. The same thing happens again later. She persuades herself that Everard is somehow trying to help her. She also interprets all his telegrams as signs of danger of some kind.

Part XXII. She thinks her services as Everard’s protector will come to an end, and she will be obliged to accept Mr Mudge. However, the very next day Everard arrives with an urgent telegram. Next day he comes back again saying he wants to recover a telegram sent some time ago.

Part XXIII. She procrastinates in trying to locate the telegram for him, but in the end supplies the information he needs. She has memorised it, because of her interest in his correspondence.

Part XXIV. During the late summer low season Mrs Jordan continues to boast about her connections with high society. She invites the young woman back to her humble rooms in Maida Vale. She is engaged to marry Mr Drake.

Part XXV. Mrs Jordan reveals that Mr Drake is due to be engaged (as a butler) by Lady Bradeen – who is a correspondent of Captain Everard’s via his telegrams. Lady Bradeen is due to marry Captain Everard, following quickly on the death of her husband. The two women ‘compare’ impressions of Lady Bradeen – who neither of them know.

Part XXVI. The two women then compare their own marriage prospects comeptatively. The young woman realises that they are both doomed to live in obscurity. Nevertheless, compared to Mrs Jordan, she feels fortunate.

Part XXVII. Mrs Jordan then reveals that Captain Everard has no money at all, but lots of debts, and was involved in a social scandal from which Lady Bradeen saved him – but forced him to marry her as the price for doing so.

The young woman departs, more glad than ever to have the prospect of her own home and marriage to Mr Mudge.

Other works by Henry James

The Aspern Papers (1888) is a psychological drama set in Venice which centres on the tussle for control of a great writer’s correspondence. An elderly lady, ex-lover of the writer, seeks a husband for her daughter. But the potential purchaser of the papers is a dedicated bachelor. Money is also at stake – but of course not discussed overtly. There is a refined battle of wills between them. Who will win in the end? As usual, James keeps the reader guessing. The novella is a masterpiece of subtle narration, with an ironic twist in its outcome. This collection of stories also includes three of his accomplished long short stories – The Private Life, The Middle Years, and The Death of the Lion.
Buy the book from Amazon UK
Buy the book from Amazon US

The Spoils of Poynton (1896) is a short novel which centres on the contents of a country house, and the question of who is the most desirable person to inherit it via marriage. The owner Mrs Gereth is being forced to leave her home to make way for her son and his greedy and uncultured fiancee. Mrs Gereth develops a subtle plan to take as many of the house’s priceless furnishings with her as possible. But things do not go quite according to plan. There are some very witty social ironies, and a contest of wills which matches nouveau-riche greed against high principles. There’s also a spectacular finale in which nobody wins out.
Buy the book from Amazon UK
Buy the book from Amazon US

Daisy Miller (1879) is a key story from James’s early phase in which a spirited young American woman travels to Europe with her wealthy but commonplace mother. Daisy’s innocence and her audacity challenge social conventions, and she seems to be compromising her reputation by her independent behaviour. But when she later dies in Rome the reader is invited to see the outcome as a powerful sense of a great lost potential. This novella is a great study in understatement and symbolic power.
Buy the book from Amazon UK
Buy the book from Amazon US

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Complete Works
Sixty books in one 13.5 MB Kindle eBook download for £1.92 at Amazon.co.uk. The complete novels, stories, travel writing, and prefaces. Also includes his autobiographies, plays, and literary criticism – with illustrations.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

Henry James on the Internet Movie Database
Adaptations of James’s novels and stories for the cinema and television – in various languages. Full details of directors and actors, production features, film reviews, box office, and even quizzes.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

Jersey Villas

August 21, 2013 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

Jersey Villas was first published in Cosmopolitan Magazine in July—August 1892. Its next appearance in book form was as part of the collection The Real Thing and Other Stories, published by Macmilla in New York and London the following year in 1893. When it appeared in book form it was given a different title – Sir Dominick Ferrand.

It is one of a number of tales which James wrote on the theme of private papers and letters, the practice of biography, and the rights of an individual to privacy, even after death. James created a bonfire of his own personal papers in the fear of what writers and critics might find out about his private life after his demise. Of course we now know that he had a lot more to hide than was hitherto thought.

A davenport desk

Jersey Villas – critical commentary

The story is composed of two dramatic elements. The first is Peter Baron’s discovery of the letters in his writing desk, and his dilemma regarding what to do with them – to publish them, sell them, or hand them over to his editor Mr Locket. The second element is his developing romantic relationship with Mrs Ryves, which is reinforced by his writing a successful libretto for her musical composition.

For the first-time reader there is a dramatic tension (or mystery) in how these two elements are going to be related. James seems to be hinting at some mystical or intuitive connection between Mrs Ryves and Baron’s dealings with the letters. She is agitated or distressed whenever he tries to make a decision about them. There is also something of a mystery about her claims to be leaving Jersey Villas, followed by her failure to do so.

Her connection with the letters and her indecision about staying or leaving the Villas is easily explained at a later stage. She is the illegitimate daughter of Sir Dominick Ferrand, and the revelation of his private mis-doings will (or might) adversely affect her. She senses that Baron has discovered something and visits him on a ‘sudden fancy’ to check. Then as soon as he has told her about breaking the seals, she leaves the Villas and goes to Dover, where she is ‘looking at the Calais boat’ whilst in discussion with him. In other words, she is planning her escape to ‘Europe’ (which was considered a different world in the nineteenth century).

All the hints and development within the plot suggest that her erratic behaviour is the result of her knowing that Baron has her father’s letters. This explains why she is so keen that he burn them, and once she is secure in the knowledge that he has done so, she can relax and form a relationship with him.

But this interpretation of the story, which is certainly invited by the events of the story, rests on two or three flaws, and it is distinctly possible that James is playing fast and loose with his famous ambiguity and evasiveness in this instance. To begin with, at no point does Mrs Ryves know who has written the letters. There is no writing on the outside of the letters, and they are in packets that are sealed. She even tells Baron that she doesn’t want to know who wrote them.

It might be argued that she recognises the letters, or even that the davenport Baron bought originally belonged to her father. But there is also nothing in the text to support either of these two explanations – and she she is not raised in her paternal home, so it is very unlikely that any form of ‘recognition’ takes place.

Jersey Villas – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1892—1898 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1892—1898 – Library of America – Amazon US

Jersey Villas – eBook versions at Project Gutenberg

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

Jersey Villas – plot summary

Part I. Aspiring writer Peter Baron has been summoned by Mr Locket, the editor of The Promiscuous Review, to make changes to a story he has submitted. That morning he has made the acquaintence of Mrs Ryves, a fellow lodger of Mrs Bundy at Jersey Villas, a suburban lodging house. After his meeting with the editor, he walks down the Kings Road, dreaming of refurbishing his humble rooms. On the strength of his submitted story, he buys a small second-hand davenport, which he hopes could inspire his literary creation.

Part II. Baron befriends Mrs Ryves and her son, and he writes lyrics for the songs she composes as an amateur pianist, guiltily conscious that he ought to be correcting his story for the magazine. He discovers that the davenport has a false back, where he finds packets of old letters. When Mrs Ryves calls, claiming she has been worried about him, he decides to tell her about his discovery. She urges him to keep the letters, and claims that she felt an instinct to ‘save’ the papers. And yet she also suggests that he burn them.

Part III. Ten days later Baron visits Mr Locket and tells him he has new materials on Sir Dominick Farrand, an eminent stateman. He insists that they are genuine and not forgeries. Locket does not think the public will be much interested in him now that he is dead. Baron insists that he was a complex person, and that the letters reveal some dubious political dealings, as he had received money from people to whom he had awarded contracts. They also reveal evidence of an extra-marital affair. Baron and Locket circle round each other inconclusively over what is to be done.

Part IV. When Mrs Ryves goes to Dover, Baron asks Mrs Bundy for information about her, but gets very little information. So he goes to Dover, where he meets Mrs Ryves with her son Sydney and Miss Teagle, a governess to Sydney. He reproaches Mrs Ryves for disappearing as soon as he made his discovery known to her. She claims that the papers ‘haunt’ her. He cannot understand why she is bothered about them at all. He wants to ask her to marry him, but realises that he has nothing to offer her.

Part V. Next day Mr Locket turns up and ‘borrows’ the letters, which makes Baron anxious about his motives. Mrs Ryves writes from Dover about their musical collaboration. Then Locket summons him and offers £100 for the letters. Baron is conflicted over his options: he is badly in debt and needs the money, but he can see Locket profiteering from his advantageous position as influential editor.

Part VI. When Baron returns to Jersey Villas he finds Mrs Ryves who claims she is packing to leave, but doesn’t appear to be doing so. He takes her out to dinner and the theatre, and later tries to improve his chances with her, but she puts him off.

Part VII. Mr Locket turns up again next morning with an offer increased to £300, whilst meanwhile Mrs Ryves is leaving the Villas. Baron tries to plea bargain with Locket for his fiction to be accepted as part of the deal. Locket at first refuses, then gives in. But on reflection, Baron feels that it would be wrong to make money out of exposing someone’s reputation to disgrace, and he burns the letters.

Mrs Ryves returns to say that a music publisher has accepted their joint composition and wants more of the same. They share the £50 fee and at Dover return to the question of their future. She reveals that she is a ‘poor girl’ with no money, family, or friends. She ultimately rveals that she is the illegitimate daughter of Sir Dominick Ferrand. After a probationary period, they marry, have success in music publishing, and Baron even manages to get some of his fiction published in magazines.

Jersey Villas – principal characters

Peter Baron	an aspiring young writer
Mr Locket	editor of The Promiscuous Review
Mrs Ryves	a poor widow and pianist
Sydney	her young son
Mrs Bundy	landlady at Jersey Villas
Miss Teagle	governess to Sydney

Other works by Henry James

Washington Square (1880) is a superb early short novel, It’s the tale of a young girl whose future happiness is being controlled by her strict authoritarian (but rather witty) father. She is rather reserved, but has a handsome young suitor. However, her father disapproves of him, seeing him as an opportunist and a fortune hunter. There is a battle of wills – all conducted within the confines of their elegant New York town house. Who wins out in the end? You will probably be surprised by the outcome. This is a masterpiece of social commentary, offering a sensitive picture of a young woman’s life.
Buy the book from Amazon UK
Buy the book from Amazon US

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

John Delavoy

March 27, 2012 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, and web links

John Delavoy was first published in Cosmopolis magazine for January—February in 1898. It is one of the many stories Henry James wrote towards the end of the century that are concerned with literary life, critical reputations, the relationship between authors and biography, and the actual profession of ‘letters’ in its commercial workings. (Others include The Aspern Papers (1888), The Coxon Fund (1894), The Death of the Lion (1894), The Figure in the Carpet (1896), and The Abasement of the Northmores (1900),

James was intensely concerned with his own literary reputation, which had taken a powerful knock when he was booed off stage when taking the author’s bow at the first night of his play Guy Domville in 1895. He took great care in revising his own work, and both rewrote his own novels and composed powerfully defensive prefaces to them when they were published in the twenty-four volume New York edition of his selected works in 1910. John Delavoy deals with the relationship between author and magazine editor, where financial and aesthetic objectives sometimes produced dramatic collisions.

Henry James – portrait by John Singer Sargeant

John Delavoy – critical commentary

The narrative

The story at its outset seems destined to be relayed via the account of yet another of Henry James’s unreliable narrators. It begins with not one but two false identifications in the theatre. The narrator’s companion mistakes Beston for Lord Yarrocombe, and then the narrator himself assumes Miss Delavoy to be Delavoy’s wife, when she is in fact his sister.

Moreover, the narrator is full of false confidence and self-importance. Speaking of his own article, he describes it as

a summary of the subject, deeply interesting and treated, as I thought, with extraordinary art, of the work to which I gave the highest place in my author’s array.

And yet in the end he does not turn out to be unreliable. His rival the editor Beston is revealed as vulgar and unprincipled. He wishes to profit from Delavoy’s reputation as a novelist, but will not allow any examination of what he is famous for – his work – on the grounds that ‘relations between the sexes’ has no place in his magazine The Cynosure. The narrator (and Miss Delavoy) are presented as those who truly value the novelist’s work

James’s inspiration for this story sprang out of a similar conflict he had endured after writing an article on Alexander Dumas. A publisher turned it down on the grounds that the content of Dumas’s work was not acceptable. James records his own reaction and the germs for his inspiration in his Notebooks:

Oh the whole thing does open up as a donnée! Their hope that one would have given a ‘personal’ account of a distinguished man, a mere brief, reserved, simply intelligible statement of the subject matter [of] whose work is too scandalous to print. They want to seem to deal with him because he is famous—and he is famous because he wrote certain things which they won’t for the world have intelligibly mentioned. So they desire the supreme though clap-trap tribute of an intimate picture, without even the courage of saying on what ground they desire any mention of him at all.

So James settled the historical score against short-sighted magazine editors, yet curiously enough he didn’t match the achievement of his far more sombre tales. There is no ironic distance between narrator and the narrative he delivers. We are forced to take what he says at face value, and are led into accepting the story as a mildly amusing spat between upholders of aesthetic value and managers of the literary marketplace.

A secondary theme

It’s interesting to note that the themes of authorship, biography, and reputation are also linked with a recurrent preoccupation of James’s at the time – the question of whether to marry or not. In stories such as The Beast in the Jungle, Owen Wingrave, and The Altar of the Dead the decision to avoid marriage is seen as leading to emotional bankruptcy and even death. These powerful tales are generally regarded as amongst the highest achievements of James as an author of short stories.

James Delavoy is altogether lighter in tone, and we are given every reason to believe that the conclusion of the narrative is to be taken as a positive outcome which has resulted in marriage. The narrator reports ‘we had achived the union that—at least for resistance or endurance—is supposed to be strength’ He and Miss Delavoy are united in their admiration for the novelist’s work, and have that as intellectual comfort in the face of Beston’s empty triumph on The Cynosure with his crass pursuit of readership and cheap publicity.

Yet comparison with stories offering more sombre variations on the same theme reveals their amazing strength, John Delavoy is not nearly so aesthetically satisfying as Owen Wingrave, or The Beast in the Jungle. The conclusion to the story is amazingly rushed – as if James had lost interest in his subject and was eager to get it out of the way.

In fact the pencil sketch over which they have expended so much emotional energy is first described by the narrator ‘as a flower in the coat of a bridegroom’. Defenders of James’s achievement in this story might well wish to quote this as a clever pre-echo of the outcome, or even a sub-conscious wish on the part of the narrator.

James never did marry, but he certainly gave the matter a lot of thought. In this story he gives artistic expression to a heterosexual relationship with a positive if conventional outcome. But as an artistic resolution it does not seem persuasive or satisfying – as if he couldn’t really quite believe in it himself.

John Delavoy – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1892—1898 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1892—1898 – Library of America – Amazon US

The Complete Tales (Vol 9) – Paperback edition – Amazon UK

Selected Tales – Penguin Classics edition – Amazon UK

John Delavoy – print on demand reissue – Amazon UK

John Delavoy – eBook formats at Project Gutenberg

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

John Delavoy – plot summary

An un-named narrator has written a literary appreciation of John Delavoy, a novelist who has recently died. At the first night performance of an unsuccessful play he sees Miss Delavoy, the novelist’s sister who is in morning for her brother. She is accompanied by Mr Beston, the editor of The Cynosure a literary magazine.

When the narrator visits Beston he persuades him to accept an article on Delavoy to make the public aware of his greatness. Beston is reluctant, but agrees on condition that Miss Delavoy approves it first – which she does.

Publication is delayed however, and Miss Delavoy is upset on the narrator’s behalf. She has drawn a sketch of Delavoy, the only known portrait, which is offered to Beston as an inducement to adorn the article and speed up publication.

But when the essay is set in galley proofs, Beston rejects it as unacceptable on the grounds that it is ‘indecent’ because it deals with ‘relations between the sexes’. He wants Miss Delavoy to write instead a personal memoir of her brother which will include lightweight gossip for his readers.

Miss Delavoy and the narrator are both outraged at this suggestion. She asks the narrator to be present at a meeting with Beston where she insists that he print the article. She also threatens to withdraw permission to use the portrait.

But Beston puts the interests of his circulation figures above all else, refuses to give in, and obviously has no appreciation of John Delavoy at all. The narrator tries to recover the portrait from him, but fails.

The portrait appears in the magazine, accompanied by a couple of pages of lightweight comment, and proves to be a big success. The narrator publishes his original article elsewhere – to little effect – but by way of compensation it is strongly implied that he marries Miss Delavoy.

Principal characters

I	the un-named narrator, a writer and literary critic
Windon	an unsuccessful dramatist
John Delavoy	an ‘immense novelist’ who has recently died
Miss Delavoy	his sister
Mr Beston	editor of The Cynosure, a literary magazine

Henry James’s study

Other works by Henry James

&copy Roy Johnson 2012

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

Julia Bride

June 9, 2012 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, and web links

Julia Bride first appeared in Harper’s Magazine in March-April 1908. It is collected in Volume XII of The Complete Tales of Henry James (Rupert Hart-Davis) 1964.

The Metropolitan Museum – Frank Waller (1842-1923)

Julia Bride – critical commentary

The woman question

Readers of this story will not fail to recognise its similarity to Edith Wharton’s The House of Mirth which was published three years earlier. Henry James was great friend and admirer of his fellow American writer, and her heroine Lily Bart faces very similar problems to those of Julia Bride. However, Wharton takes her heroine’s situation to a further extreme than James. Lily Bart is actually reduced to working for her living, and is so unused to it she becomes a drug addict. This is something James seems almost to hint at in his remarks to his ‘Preface’ to the New York Edition of his Collected Works:

Julia is ‘foreshortened’, I admit, to within an inch of her life; but I judge her life still saved and yet at the same time the equal desideratum, its depicted full fusion with other lives that remain undepicted, not lost.

This seems to be Henry James’s way of saying that this is a short story – not the more fully developed novella or the full length novel that Edith Wharton brought off so successfully. He cannot pretend to encompass the full resolution of Julia Bride’s situation or those of the people who surround her. So technically, the story ends in an unresolved state.

But there seems to be very little alternative to seeing her story as a tragedy with a fairly conclusive ending. After all, it is very unlikely that a young woman with such a disreputable family background, no money, and six failed engagements behind her would ever find success in the upper echelons of old-fashioned and hidebound American society.

Julia is caught in the pincer movement of the new possibilities of social fluidity, class mobility, and personal freedoms offered by American society, and the rigid ethics, snobbery, and financially-based social codes that America had imported from Europe.

New social movements such as divorce and re-marriage are available under the freedoms of an open, democratic, and republican society which has freed itself from the organizational shackles of its European forebears. It is even possible to become engaged more than once. But the deeper ideological undercurrents of this society are deeply enmeshed in capital accumulation and preserving status via intermarriage amongst an elite class.

As is commonly remarked amongst commentators on this story, Julia will always be a Bride, but it is unlikely she will ever get married.

Public places

It is worth noting that the main events of the story are enacted in very public places. The narrative begins in the Metropolitan Museum and its denouement takes place in Central Park. Julia is able to talk to Basil French and then Mr Pitman without putting her reputation at risk, because they are in public view in the museum. She then arranges to meet Murray Brush in the Park for similar reasons.

At the end of the nineteenth century and even the beginning of the twentieth, young unmarried people had to be very circumspect about who they met, and in what circumstances. This was particularly true for women. A hidden irony in this story is that Julia has already compromised herself socially by having six previous engagements.

Even visits to family homes had to be carefully orchestrated so as not to give rise to any social comment, and of course the visit itself would be carefully monitored for both content and duration. This explains the frequency with which broughams and cabs outside someone’s front door are featured in stories and novels of the period. The livery of the vehicle would be a clear indication of ownership. It was a society in which everybody knew everybody else’s business, and social reputations were held in very high esteem – albeit often at a theoretical level.

Of course all this only pertained to the very small social elite which constituted the upper class and the aristocracy of a given European or American society. This is one of the things which makes novels a rich form of social history – because they include a record of the manners and morals of this part of society at the time, the details and social nuances of which are not easily obtainable elsewhere.

Julia Bride – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1898—1910 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1898—1910 – Library of America – Amazon US

Julia Bride – Digireads reprint – Amazon UK

Julia Bride – eBook at Project Gutenberg

Julia Bride – read the story on line

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

The Prefaces of Henry James – Introductions to his tales and novels

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

Julia Bride – plot summary

Part I. Julia Bride is being courted by Basil French, the son of a wealthy but very traditional New York family. They meet in the Metropolitan Museum then part leaving her worried. He wants to know more about her background, and she is reluctant to let him know that her mother has been divorced twice (and is soon likely to be so for a third time). Moreover Julia herself has been engaged six times. In the museum she meets Mr Pitman, her mother’s second husband, with whom she has remained friendly.

Part II. She hopes he might be able to help her out of her social dilemma, but in fact he wants her to help him in a similar but contradictory manner. He asks her to plead his innocence with Mrs Drack, a wealthy widow who he hopes to marry. Julia in her turn wants Pitman to eradicate in the eyes of Basil French both her mother’s guilt in her divorce, and her own six previous engagements – largely by telling lies. Julia feels kindly disposed to Pitman, and ends up singing his praises to Mrs Drack. At Pitman’s suggestion Julia then contacts Murray Brush, the most recent of her ex-fiancées and asks him to announce publicly that their relationship was only ever one of close friendship. She hopes this will effectively wipe her slate clean so far as Basil French is concerned.

Part III. Brush readily agrees, and for good measure announces that he is going to be married to Mary Lindeck. He wants Julia to meet her and promises that she will help in their endeavour. But as this apparently successful meeting continues, Julia begins to feel that Murray is agreeing to her plan in the hope of meeting the much richer Frenches with a view to socially advancing himself and his wife to be. Julia is devastated by this realisation, feels that she is doomed to failure, and is left in a tragically sentimental admiration of Basil French – a man who can have such an effect of others, and whom she will never gain.

Principal characters

Julia Bride	a beautiful single young American girl with a chequered past
Mrs Connery	her mother (47) who has been divorced twice
Mr Pitman	the second of her mother’s husbands
Basil French	the rich young son of a wealthy traditional family
Mr Connery	Julia’s mother’s third husband – ‘irrepressibly vulgar’
Mrs David E. Drack	a wealthy and overweight widow
Murray Brush	Julia’s most recent ex-financé
Mary Lindeck	Murray Brush’s fiancée

Henry James and Edith Wharton go motoring

Other works by Henry James

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

Lady Barbarina

March 16, 2013 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

Lady Barbarina was written in Boston in 1883 and first appeared in Century Magazine in May—July 1884. The original publication of this story has the title as Lady Barberina, but when James came to discuss the story in his famous prefaces for the New York edition of his collected works, it became Lady Barbarina. Its first appearance in book form was in the collection of stories Tales of Three Cities published in Boston by Osgood and in London by Macmillan in 1884.

Rotten Row – Hyde Park – 19th century

Lady Barbarina – critical commentary

Theme

This is one in a long line of James’s ‘International’ stories – tales which are based on the differences between American and European cultures. In many of them an attractive American woman will arrive in Europe and captivate an Italian prince (The Golden Bowl) or an English gentleman (The Wings of the Dove). But this tale reverses the pattern: a rich and successful American man in London is captivated by the sheer ‘Englishness’ of an aristocratic woman who has very little to commend her except her good looks and her heritage.

That is Jackson Lemon’s tragedy. He is blinded by his own Anglomania, and ends up hopelessly uprooted from his native America, saddled with a bloodless wife who doesn’t really love him, and supporting his feckless brother-in-law – a rogue fellow American whose only positive feature is a fine moustache.

Jackson Lemon even has a noble profession. He has trained and practised as a doctor – but he has also inherited his father’s wealth (gained via manufacture). The English aristocrats however even look down on this activity – as if it is demeaning to have any profession at all. Yet they are greedy enough for his wealth to insist on a settlement for their daughter – a guaranteed source of income in the event of any problems, which underlines the financial basis of marriage in the upper class as a means of consolidating wealth.

Yet it has to be said that James treats this subject quite lightly. Jackson Lemon’s open and slightly naive attitude to the English aristocracy is mildly satirised, and the horrendously snobbish, cold, and imperious attitudes of the Cantervilles are illustrated but in the end prevail. They are the ones short of money, and yet Lemon finishes up subsidising them by maintaining their two daughters and son-in-law.

Structure.

The most striking feature of this tale is its amazingly rushed ending. The story begins at a remarkably leisurely pace – with detailed conversations and atmospheric mise en scenes stretching out page after page. Inconsequential characters such as the Freers occupy much of the dramatic interest, and Lemon’s hesitations and advances are tracked minutely as he pays court to Lady Barbarina

There is a hiatus at the centre of the story during which the first six months of Jackson’s marriage to Lady Barbarina are omitted from the narrative – but this serves to reinforce the dramatic impact of its disappointing outcome.

The second part of the story begins by documenting Lady Barbarina’s dissatisfactions with America, and opens up the sub-plot of Lady Agatha’s enthusiastic embracing of American freedoms. But then no sooner has she eloped with Longstraw than the story is wrapped up as if James had lost interest in his characters and story – or maybe reached the number of words required by the publisher.

Literally within the last page of the story the Jackson Lemons return to London, Lady Barbarina has a little girl, Jackson starts travelling across to the continent to escape his unsatisfactory marriage, and Lady Agatha returns from California with her husband who is a great social success. This is all too much narrative weight for the story to bear.

Lady Barberina – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1884—1891 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1884—1891 – Library of America – Amazon US

Lady Barbarina – CreateSpace edition

Lady Barbarina – Kindle edition

Lady Barbarina – eBook formats at Gutenberg

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

Lady Barbarina – plot summary

Elderly Americans Dexter Freer and his wife sit in Hyde Park, discussing the marriage prospects of their fellow countryman Jackson Lemon with a young doctor Sydney Feeder. Jackson Lemon is a very rich non-practising doctor who has been courting Lady Barbarina, the second eldest daughter of an English Marquis. It is thought that despite Lemon’s wealth, his status as a professional will count against him with the aristocracy, even though they themselves are thought not to be particularly wealthy.

Jackson is questioned by Lady Lucretia Beauchemin about his intentions regarding her younger sister Barbarina. She is seeking clarity: he remains non-commital. He realises that English society expects him to reveal his intentions or to desist in his attentions towards Barbarina – but he values his freedom as a democratic American to act as he wishes.

He finds Barbarina physically attractive, but wonders if she will fit in with New York City life. He goes to a late night society dance and discusses American and English marriage customs with Barbarina. He is frustrated by English conventions on social contact, but eventually openly declares his love for her.

Next day he asks her father for permission to marry her, revealing both his wealth and his origins. Lord Canterville asks his wife’s opinions on the matter. She is concerned that her daughter would live in America. There is conflict between Jackson’s open, independent, and free approach to social conventions, and Lady Canterville’s old-fashioned and snobbish conventions.

The Canterville’s accept Jackson’s proposal, but they demand via solicitors that he make a ‘settlement’ (an income) on her – a suggestion that offends him. When he refuses they restrict access to his bride-to-be. They also object to the fact that his wealth is new money, and therefore in their eyes unstable.

When he discusses the matter with his American friend Mrs Freer, she advises him to get out of the engagement because Lady Barbarina’s aristocratic attitudes will never be compatible with life in New York City. Dexter Freer on the other hand encourages him to defy convention. Following this, Jackson decides to give in to the demands of the Cantervilles, because he thinks that making settlements is beneath his dignity.

Six months later the marriage is already in trouble. Lady Barbarina is bored in New York and wishes she were back in England. Her sister Agatha however, who has been sent to accompany her by the Cantervilles, perceives all the advantages of life in America. She forms an attachment to Mrs Lemon and has an admirer in the Californian Hermann Longstraw – of whom Jackson Lemon disapproves. Mrs Lemon is very concerned about her son’s marriage.

Lemon wants his wife to establish a European-style salon in New York, but quite apart from her natural idleness Lady Barbarina thinks that her social rival Mrs Vanderdecken will usurp her. Lady Agatha meanwhile continues to enjoy her newfound freedom and independence. But when Longstraw asks to marry Agatha, Lady Barbarina seizes this as an excuse and insists that she must immediately take her sister back to England.

But Agatha precipitates matters by eloping to California with Longstraw. The scandal of this reckless marriage reaches all the newspapers and the news is relayed to England. At this, Lady Canterville demands that Barbarina return home. Lemon is forced to return to live in England, where he ends up with his cold and unimaginative wife and supporting his improvident brother and sister-in-law.

Principal characters

Dexter Freer	elderly American socialite visiting London
Mrs Freer	his wife
Marquis of Canterville	an impoverished English aristocrat
Lady Barbarina	his younger daughter
Lady Agatha	younger sister to Lady Barbarina
Lady Lucretia Beauchemin	his eldest daughter
Pasterns	‘the seat of the Cantervilles’
Dr Sydney Feeder	an American medic from Cincinnati
Dr Jackson Lemon	a small, rich, New York non-practising medic who has inherited
Lady Marmaduke	social godmother to Jackson Lemon, a friend of Lady Beauchemin
Herman Longstraw	a Californian with an impressive moustache
Mrs Vanderdecken	a New York social hostess and rival to Lady Barbarina
Mrs Chew	a friend of Mrs Vanderdecken

Henry James – portrait by John Singer Sargeant

Other works by Henry James

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

Longstaff’s Marriage

May 12, 2013 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

Longstaff’s Marriage first appeared in magazine form in Scribner’s Monthly for August 1878. Stories by popular writers Bret Harte and Edward Egglestone appeared in the same issue, It was then reprinted in book form amongst The Madonna of the Future and Other Stories the following year.

Longstaff’s Marriage – critical commentary

The principal feature of this story is the structural symmetry and the ironic reversals of the two ‘deathbed’ scenes. In the first the proud and beautiful Diana seems to have everything to gain when Longstaff makes his appeal to her, but she rejects his offer indignantly.

We are then asked to believe in two outcomes from this episode. The first is that the shock of this rejection somehow gives Longstaff the jolt he needs to restore his own health. Since we have no medical information about his state of being during his period of decline, this is very hard to judge.

The other is that at the same time Diana somehow retrospectively falls in love with Longstaff – even though she does not see him for more than two years. This is something of a stretch, but just about plausible.

But then comes another symmetrical twist which stretches credulity – to breaking point. Diana herself develops a wasting ailment which would be acceptable if she were simply pining away for love of Longstaff and might be restored on resumption of contact with him. Her proposal to him is acceptable enough as the neat plot twist – but she really is on her death bed and dies shortly afterwards.

This seems like a gain for plot structure at the expense of plausibility. The architecture of the story is firm enough, but its content is not satisfactory.

Longstaff’s Marriage – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1874—1884 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1874—1884 – Library of America – Amazon US

Longstaff’s Marriage – Kindle edition

Longstaff’s Marriage – Paperback edition [£4.49]

Longstaff’s Marriage – eBook versions at Gutenberg

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

Longstaff’s Marriage – plot summary

Diana Belfield has inherited money and divided it with her cousin Agatha Gosling. The two women travel to Europe and are in Nice for the winter season. Agatha is much given to fantasising about their fellow residents, and they see Reginald Longstaff on the promenade regularly, she assumes that he is in love with Diana.

Longstaff introduces himself to Agatha and reveals that he is dying and very much in love with Diana. He asks Agatha not to reveal this to Diana until after his death.

Agatha keeps her promise, but some time later Longstaff’s servant asks Agatha to bring Diana to Longstaff’s sick bed, where he is thought to be dying. When they go there, he makes a moving appeal to Diana, asking her to marry him. Diana insists that she finds the idea appalling and suggests that they leave Nice immediately.

Their subsequent travels deteriorate in quality, so they decide to go back to America.Two years later Diana writes to Agatha to say that she is engaged – but then breaks it off. Diana then summons Agatha to say that she is dying and wants to go back to Europe. Diana is eager to travel widely before she dies, and they end up in Rome, where they meet Longstaff again.

Diana reveals to Agatha that she has been in love with Longstaff ever since refusing his offer of marriage, and she now believes he has recovered because of the hurt she inflicted on him. The implication is that she in her turn is now ‘dying of love’.

Agatha is sent in search of Longstaff, and when he visits the dying Diana it is she who proposes to him. The next day they are married, and shortly afterwards she dies.

Principal characters

Diana Belfield	a tall, attractive, proud, American heiress
Agatha Gosling	her cousin
Reginald Longstaff	a young Englishman from an old, high-toned family

Henry James’s study

Other works by Henry James

The Bostonians (1886) is a novel about the early feminist movement. The heroine Verena Tarrant is an ‘inspirational speaker’ who is taken under the wing of Olive Chancellor, a man-hating suffragette and radical feminist. Trying to pull her in the opposite direction is Basil Ransom, a vigorous young man to whom Verena becomes more and more attracted. The dramatic contest to possess her is played out with some witty and often rather sardonic touches, and as usual James keeps the reader guessing about the outcome until the very last page.

Buy the book at Amazon UK
Buy the book at Amazon US

What Masie Knew (1897) A young girl is caught between parents who are in the middle of personal conflict, adultery, and divorce. Can she survive without becoming corrupted? It’s touch and go – and not made easier for the reader by the attentions of an older man who decides to ‘look after’ her. This comes from the beginning of James’s ‘Late Phase’, so be prepared for longer and longer sentences. In fact it’s said that whilst composing this novel, James switched from writing longhand to using dictation – and it shows if you look carefully enough – part way through the book.
Buy the book at Amazon UK
Buy the book at Amazon US

The Ambassadors (1903) Lambert Strether is sent from America to Paris to recall Chadwick Newsome, a young man who is reported to be compromising himself by an entanglement with a wicked woman. However, Strether’s mission fails when he is seduced by the social pleasures of the European capital, and he takes Newsome’s side. So a second ambassador is dispatched in the form of the more determined Sarah Pocock. She delivers an ultimatum which is resisted by the two young men, but then an accident reveals unpleasant truths to Strether, who is faced by a test of loyalty between old Europe and the new USA. This edition presents the latest scholarship on James and includes an introduction, notes, selected criticism, a text summary and a chronology of James’s life and times.
Buy the book at Amazon UK
Buy the book at Amazon US

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

Lord Beaupre

December 2, 2012 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, and web links

Lord Beaupre first appeared in Macmillan’s Magazine in April—June 1892. It was first called Lord Beauprey but then given its new title when the tale was reprinted in the collection The Private Life published in London by Osgood, McIlvaine in 1893.

Wakehurst Place – West Sussex

Lord Beaupre – critical comment

The main dramatic interest in this tale is supplied by the bogus engagement between Guy and Mary. Despite the fact that Mary is reluctant to join in the scheme, and despite Guy’s cavalier attitude to its possible consequences, the reader is given every reason to believe that it will eventually turn into a sincere commitment and lead to marriage.

Mrs Gosselin believes that Guy is in love with her daughter, but that he does not yet realise it. Mary on her part believes that once the charade has served its purpose of keeping away marriageable young women, Guy will feel his way to make her a new and this time genuine proposal.

Other characters in the story are of the same opinion: they explain the peculiarity of an engagement without any declared dates by the idea that Mary is trying to ‘snare’ Guy, or that given time they will come to genuinely love each other.

This is exactly what happens. Guy certainly does come to realise how much Mary means to him – but only when it is too late, and she has accepted Bolton-Brown’s offer of marriage.

Lord Beaupre – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1892—1898 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1892—1898 – Library of America – Amazon US

The Complete Tales of Henry James – Volume 8 – Digireads reprint – UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle eBook edition

Lord Beaupré – eBook formats at Project Gutenberg

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Lord Beaupre – plot summary

PartI. Guy Firminger is a young man with no occupation and no prospects. In conversation with old friends Mrs Gosselin and her daughter Mary, he discusses marriage and the condition of the young bachelor, bemoaning the fact that young men are seen as prey by mothers with daughters to marry.

Part II. Following three deaths in his extended family, Guy inherits the title Lord Beaupré and the wealth that goes with it. He then complains that as predicted he is being pursued by mothers and their daughters – especially by his plain eldest cousin, Charlotte Firminger. He suggests to Mary a scheme of pretending to be engaged in order to deflect the attention of would-be fortune hunters.

Part III. At a weekend party at his newly acquired estate at Bosco, the Gosselins coincide with just such a predatory mother and daughter, the Asburys. There is undeclared rivalry between Maude Asbury and Mary Gosslein for Guy’s favours, which culminate in an embarrassing scene – the outcome of which is that May Gosselin becomes engaged to Guy.

Part IV. However, this bogus engagement has been organised by Mrs Gosselin who claims she merely wishes to help Guy as an old family friend – though she is actually hoping that the engagement will lead to a sincere wish to marry. Mary herself disapproves of the deception, and points to its weaknesses and social unfairness.

Part V. Her brother Hugh also disapproves and thinks his American colleague Bolton-Brown is a more suitable candidate for Mary. Whilst Guy basks in the freedoms and comfort of his sham engagement, Hugh and Bolton-Brown return to America where they both work. Hugh tells his friend about the deception, and urges him to return to England.

Part VI. When people in society seem to suspect that something is not quite right about the engagement, Mary asks Guy to go away for three months. Guy goes to Homburg, where his is followed by his aunt and her daughter Charlotte. Bolton-Brown meanwhile arrives back from America and takes up residence close to Mrs Gosselin’s country house in Hampshire. He proposes to Mary.

But at this very point Guy returns from Germany. He and Mary go through the formalities of breaking off their engagement – even though it becomes clear that they now both have strong feelings for each other.

Mary agrees to marry Bolton-Brown, and Guy goes abroad again. Mrs Gosselin is disappointed that her plan has failed, and she prophecies difficulties ahead when Mary realises that she made the wrong choice. But in the meantime, Guy has married Charlotte, completing the symmetry of disappointments.

Principal characters

Guy Firminger	a young first cousin to Lord beaupré, who inherits his title
Mrs Ashbury	a socially ambitious mother
Maude Ashbury	her daughter
Mrs Gosselin	a socially powerful and ambitious woman
Mary Gosselin	her daughter (23) an old friend of Guy
Hugh Gosselin	her brother, a banker (30)
Frank Firminger	Guy’s uncle
Charlotte Firminger	his plain eldest daughter, Guy’s cousin, who he eventually marries
Mr Bolton-Brown	a well-to-do American banker friend of Hugh, who Mary eventually marries
Lady Whiteroy	a married admirer of Guy’s

Henry James – portrait by John Singer Sargeant

Other works by Henry James

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

Louisa Pallant

May 31, 2013 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

Louisa Pallant first appeared in magazine form in Harper’s New Monthly Magazine for February 1888, alongside contributions by William Dean Howells and George Du Maurier. It was then reprinted in book form in England and America later the same year.

Baveno – Lago di Maggiore

Louisa Pallant – critical commentary

Intertexuality

Sometimes a work of literature may contains echoes or references to another work by a different author (and the same may be true for works of art or music). They may be placed there deliberately or unintentionally. And these references may (or may not) throw extra light onto either the earlier or the later work.

Here there is a clear echo of Great Expectations (1860-61). Charles Dickens’s character Miss Havisham has been jilted at the altar and has been eaten up with bitterness ever since. As a form of revenge upon men, she trains her young ward Estella to be deliberately stony hearted. When the young hero of the novel Pip falls in love with Estella, she encourages him, then takes delight in rejecting and humiliating him.

In Louisa Pallant, the roles are similar, although the outcome is different. Louisa has been ‘engaged’ to the narrator, but has rejected him in favour of Henry Pallant. We have the impression that she chose a richer man, but her marriage has not been a success, and her husband has both died and left her without very much money.

Louisa has produced a daughter who is cold, clever, calculating, and socially ambitious. Louisa herself admits that the girl is the embodiment of her own weaknesses and flaws – but much magnified. And on the balance of events in the tale, Linda gets what she wants – a rich husband.

Fortunately, Louisa is a benign version of Miss Havisham, and she is decent enough to warn Archie against her own daughter. In fact she hints that the warning is a sort of recompense to the narrator for the distress she caused him in the past. Archie escapes in time and is spared what could have been a painful and disastrous mistake.

Louisa Pallant – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1884—1891 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1884—1891 – Library of America – Amazon US

Louisa Pallant – paperback edition – Amazon UK

Louisa Pallant – paperback edition – Amazon US

Louisa Pallant – read the original text n line

Louisa Pallant – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

Louisa Pallant – Kindle edition – Amazon US

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

Louisa Pallant – plot summary

Part I. In the spa town of Homburg, an un-named narrator meets Louisa Pallant, a former inamorata, and Linda, her pretty young daughter. Louisa formerly rejected him in favour of Mr Henry Pallant, who has since died, leaving her short of money. Although the narrator claims to be glad to have escaped his commitment to her, he also blames her for his having remained a bachelor ever since.

Part II. The narrator is particularly impressed with the daughter’s social aplomb and polish, and yet surprised that her mother seems slightly disappointed with her. The narrator’s nephew Archie arrives, and gets on well with Linda.

Part III. Louisa warns the narrator that Archie is in danger of falling in love with her daughter, and that his mother (the narrator’s sister) would disapprove. She argues that the narrator ought to take him away, out of this danger. He at first prefers to remain in Homburg, but finally decides to leave – only to find that Louisa Pallant has already departed.

Part IV. The narrator is angry at this sudden disappearance and hopes for a letter of explanation, but none comes. He and Archie travel on to Switzerland where Archie receives a letter from Louisa Pallant in Baveno on Lake Maggiore. The two men follow her there, where Louisa warns the narrator that the renewal of their relations is dangerous and much to his amazement speaks critically against her own daughter.

Part V. Louisa warns him that Linda is cold, heartless, and has a ruthless ambition to succeed socially. He protests against this, but she insists that the girl is of her own making. She claims that Linda represents all her own faults and weaknesses, only magnified. Louisa wants to save Archie from the girl’s influence. The narrator wonders if this argument might be a bluff, and that she is saving Linda for somebody richer, with a title. But Louisa argues that princes often don’t have money, and that Linda will know all about Archie’s finances.

Part VI. The two men return separately to their hotel across the lake, and the narrator worries about what Louisa might have said to Archie. But next day nothing seems any different, and the narrator goes to visit the two women alone. Louisa has spoken to Archie, but will not reveal the substance of what she has said. She advises the narrator to leave immediately. When he gets back to his hotel, Archie has left for Milan and then goes on to Venice alone. Time passes. Linda marries a rich Englishman, Archie remains single, and the narrator never discovers what was said.

Principal characters

I	the un-named narrator, an American bachelor
Charlotte Parker	the narrator’s sister
Archie Parker	the narrator’s young nephew, heir to a fortune
Mrs Louisa Pallant	a the narrator’s former lover, now a widow
Mrs Linda Pallant	her pretty and gifted daughter

Henry James – portrait by John Singer Sargeant

Other works by Henry James

Buy the book at Amazon UK
Buy the book at Amazon US

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

Madame de Mauves

June 18, 2013 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

Madame de Mauves first appeared in The Galaxy magazine for February—March 1874. It was reprinted a year later as part of James’s first book, The Passionate Pilgrim and Other Tales, published by Osgood in Boston, 1875.

Saint-Germain in Spring – by Alfred Sisley

Madame de Mauves – critical commentary

This is an astonishingly mature work for such a young writer. James was only slightly over thirty years old at the time of the tale’s publication, and he had just come to the end of a ten year apprenticeship in writing reviews and short stories. He had yet to write any major work, but Madame de Mauves certainly points to his potential ability to do so. The theme of people entombed in unhappy relationships and solving their problems by renunciation is something he would explore in The Portrait of a Lady written only a few years later.

The international theme

As someone who had lived on both continents, James made the juxtaposition of America and Europe into one of his favourite subjects. Here the contrast is made between the two Americans Longmore and Euphemia de Mauves, and the Europeans (French) Count Richard de Mauves and his sister-in-law Madame Clarin.

Mauves belongs to an old aristocratic family which has no money. So he marries the wealthy Euphemia and reverts to family type by ignoring his marriage and indulging in petty affairs almost as a way of life. Madame Clarin explains all this to Longmore, including the fact that the family has a long tradition of suffering wives who have tolerated such behaviour for the sake of the family’s ‘name’ in society.

Count Mauves has noticed Longmore’s interest in his wife, and encourages his attentions, hoping that the two of them will begin an affair which will in its turn justify his own way of life. To contemporary readers this might seem like an improbably melodramatic plot device, but in fact it is based on the historically sound observation that amongst the upper classes, sexual fidelity has never been a high priority.

So long as the appearance of propriety was maintained and no scandal allowed to sully a family’s name (a collective responsibility) adulteries of all kinds could be incorporated into the practices of upper-class life. Husbands did not have to give any reasons for being absent from their families. Wives could amuse themselves with any number of married or single men (as Euphemia does with Longmore).

The prime objective was to consolidate the family unit as a symbol of accumulated capital and property – which is why Count Mauves’ eventual suicide has been criticised by some commentators as somewhat improbable. There is no reason why he should not merely revert to his previous adulteries and keep the family and its name intact and unsullied.

Of course all this throws French society into a very dubious light compared with the upright behaviour of the two principal Americans. Longmore and Euphemia clearly love each other, but she manages to persuade him to adopt the honourable route of renunciation and self-denial. Madame Clarin on the other hand offers Longmore a ‘devil’s pact’ argument that the family traditions provide an open pathway to socially sanctioned adultery. The two Americans take the honourable way out, at the expense of their own personal happiness.

Madame de Mauves – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1874—1884 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1874—1884 – Library of America – Amazon US

Madame de Mauves – eBook formats at Gutenberg

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

Madame de Mauves – plot summary

Part I. Rich American Longmore has been in Saint Germain for six months when his fellow American acquaintance Mrs Draper introduces him to Madame Euphemia de Mauves. She is a rich American woman married to a Frenchman who is intent on spending all her money. She is domestically unhappy, and Mrs Draper encourages Longmore to ‘entertain’ her.

Part II. Euphemia has been educated in a convent and has generated a romantic ambition to marry an aristocrat. Her childhood friend Marie de Mauves invites her to the ancestral home in the Auvergne, where old Madame de Mauves advises her to ignore moral niceties and act pragmatically.

When Richard de Mauves arrives, Euphemia sees him as the epitome of an aristocratic gentleman – although he is in fact a wastrel with unpaid bills. When he proposes marriage, Euphemia is very happy. But her mother imposes a two-year ban on the relationship – but at the end of it she marries him.

Part III. Longmore visits Madame de Mauves and marvels at her resignation. Euphemia’s sister-in-law is married to a wholesale pharmacist who gambles and loses on the stock exchange, then commits suicide. The widow pays court to Longmore, who dislikes her.

He ought to join his old friend Webster in Brussels for a holiday, but feels obliged to ‘support’ Madame de Mauves in her unhappiness. Her husband absents himself from the family home, but is amazingly polite to Longmore and encourages him to keep visiting.

Part IV. Webster writes to Longmore, asking about their planned holiday. Longmore asks Euphemia if she is happy or not – and she tells him it is an entirely private matter, and encourages him to join his friend on holiday. As he takes his leave he is patronised by the Count. Longmore writes to his friend Mrs Draper with his assessment of Madame de Mauves and her husband.

Part V. Longmore goes to Paris, but instead of going on to Brussels, he lingers there, thinking about Madame de Mauves and wondering if he is in love with her or not. Whilst dining in the Bois de Boulogne he sees the Count with a woman of the streets. He returns immediately to Saint Germain where he and Madame de Mauves discuss her situation and his wish to ‘support’ her – during which the Count casually passes by. Longmore is teased and patronised by Madame Clarin.

Part VI.When Longmore next visits the house, Madame de Clarin recounts to him the family history of faithless husbands and long-suffering wives. She also reveals that because the Count’s latest ‘folly’ has been discovered, he has suggested to his wife that she take Longmore as her lover, to form a social quid pro quo.

Part VII. Longmore takes a bucolic interlude in which he meets a young artist and his lover at a country inn, then falls asleep in the forest and dreams of being separated from Madame de Mauves by her husband.

Part VIII. When Longmore next meets Madame de Mauves she wants him to make a big sacrifice for both of them (by renouncing her) – so that she can continue to have someone to look up to and respect.

Part IX. Lomgmore is deeply conflicted on the issue, and he wonders why Euphemia should be so self-denying and stoical. He retreats to Paris to think about his decision. Once again he bumps into the Count in a compromising situation. Longmore leaves Saint Germain, and the Count is severely discomfited.

Part X. Two years pass, then Longmore learns from Mrs Draper that the Count repented and begged to be re-accepted by Madame de Mauves. She refused to accept him, so he committed suicide. Longmore returns to America and remains there.

Principal characters

Longmore	a rich young man from New York
Mrs Maggie Draper	his American friend in England
Madame Euphemia de Mauves	a rich American (née Cleve)
Count Richard de Mauves	her philandering husband
Marie de Mauves	Euphenia’s young friend
old Madame de Mauves	Marie’s grandmother
Mrs Cleve	Euphenia’s mother
Madame Clarin	Euphemia’s sister-in-law
M. Clarin	wholesale druggist and gambler

Henry James – portrait by John Singer Sargeant

Other works by Henry James

The Bostonians (1886) is a novel about the early feminist movement. The heroine Verena Tarrant is an ‘inspirational speaker’ who is taken under the wing of Olive Chancellor, a man-hating suffragette and radical feminist. Trying to pull her in the opposite direction is Basil Ransom, a vigorous young man from the South to whom Verena becomes more and more attracted. The dramatic contest to possess her is played out with some witty and often rather sardonic touches, and as usual James keeps the reader guessing about the outcome until the very last page.

Buy the book at Amazon UK
Buy the book at Amazon US

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

Master Eustace

June 23, 2013 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

Master Eustace first appeared in The Galaxy magazine for November 1871. Its first appearance in book form was as part of the collection Stories Revived published in three volumes by Macmillan in London 1885.

Freddie Bartholomew as Little Lord Fauntleroy

Master Eustace – critical commentary

Melodrama

This tale has many of the elements of the nineteenth century melodrama: the long-kept secret; the self-sacrificing mother; the demanding child; the sudden revelation of paternity; the attempted suicide. the death by emotional shock. Such ingredients were common in the fiction of that period. In fact the story in theme is not unlike Thomas Hardy’s The Son’s Veto which used similar elements nearly twenty years later.

Readers in the twentieth century began to find such emotionally loaded drama difficult to accept, and the vogue for convincing realism was established which most serious writers of fiction have followed ever since. For a time there was a similar reaction against Charles Dickens, who used very overt melodrama in the plots of his novels. In the twenty-first century however, there has been a greater tolerance of melodramatic effects – provided that narratives are not solely dependent on them for significant meaning, and provided that they are supported by compensating artistic effects and psychological insights.

Checkhov’s gun

The Russian playwright and short story writer Anton Checkhov remarked that “If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it’s not going to be fired, it shouldn’t be hanging there”. The term ‘Checkhov’s gun’ is a metaphor for a dramatic principle concerning simplicity and foreshadowing.

In Matser Eustace the sudden mention of ‘pistols’ flags up to any alert reader the fact that they are likely to be used in what follows. We suspect that Eustace might shoot Mr Cope. But James adds a creative twist to this very traditional plot element. Eustace not only doesn’t shoot Mr Cope, but shoots himself in a suicide attempt – and fails. So the gun in this case turns out to be something of a red herring

There is a similar false lead in the hurried marriage of Mrs Garnyer and Mr Cope. It seems as if he might be after her money, especially when he returns suddenly after Eustace has left and when he takes over the running of her affairs. But this too turns out not to be the case.

The framed narrative

James was very fond of using the ‘framed narrative’ device in his shorter fictions – that is, the strategy of having the main story relayed to a second party, who then makes it available to the reader. This creates an ‘inner’ and an ‘outer’ narrator. Various degrees of reliability can sometimes be built in to the characterisation of the narrators (as he did most famously in The Turn of the Screw.

Sometimes the ‘frame’ is not closed but left open-ended – but in the case of Master Eustace the outer narrator introduces the story with a single short paragraph, then reappears at the conclusion to top it off with two or three comments at the conclusion of the governess’s tale. No attempt is made to construct a separate point of view by the creation of this outer narrator. These were early experiments in James’s oeuvre but they foreshadow many complex experiments which were to come in later tales.

Master Eustace – study resources

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon UK

The Complete Works of Henry James – Kindle edition – Amazon US

Complete Stories 1864—1874 – Library of America – Amazon UK

Complete Stories 1864—1874 – Library of America – Amazon US

Master Eustace – read the original text on line

The Cambridge Companion to Henry James – Amazon UK

Henry James at Wikipedia – biographical notes, links

Henry James at Mantex – tutorials, biography, study resources

Master Eustace – plot summary

Part I. A young woman of modest means takes up a position as assistant to Mrs Garnyer, a sad and frail widow whose husband mistreated her. She has a son Eustace on whom she lavishes all her attention and pins all her hopes. The child is demanding, spoiled, and arrogant: he patronises and insults his governess.

Part II. The child grows older, and a succession of tutors are employed. All of them fall in love with their employer, and are rejected out of hand. The governess becomes a companion and maid-of-all-sorts to Mrs Garnyer. The youth’s birthdays are celebrated by dressing up and fantasies, and the mother remains completely isolated from society, treating her son almost as a lover in waiting.

Part III. Eustace is keenly aware of what he will inherit and cultivates a taste for luxuries. He creates an idealised image of the father he has never known, and vows to live like him. Mrs Garnyer receives occasional advice from Mr Cope, an old family friend in India. He advises letting Eustace travel in Europe, as he wishes. The youth departs, then she receives a message saying that Cope will be returning. When he settles in the house Mrs Garnyer is transformed into a vibrant and youthful woman again. The governess too is very impressed with Mr Cope.

Part IV. The governess presumes that Mrs Garnyer and Mr Cope were once due to marry, but were forced by circumstances to marry other (unsuitable) people. She writes to Eustace about Mr Cope and his mother’s improved condition. Then Mrs Garnyer announces that she is due to marry Mr Cope, who will take over the running of her affairs. They marry quite quickly, then depart on honeymoon, leaving the governess in charge of the house.

Part V. Eustace suddenly returns the next day. When he hears that his mother has actually married Mr Cope he explodes with petulant rage. The governess sends word to his mother that he has come home and is not well, asking her to come back. Later that nigh they all converge in the house. Eustace curses and disowns his mother in a jealous outrage.

Part VI. Mrs Garnyer feels that her son’s curse has killed her, and she unburdens herself to the governess. Mr Cope reveals to Eustace that he is his father. Eustace tries to commit suicide, but fails. Mrs Garnyer dies, and the two men shake hands – but only once, as father and son – and are never reconciled.

Henry James – portrait by John Singer Sargeant

Other works by Henry James

Henry James – web links

Henry James at Mantex
Biographical notes, study guides, tutorials on the Complete Tales, book reviews. bibliographies, and web links.

The Ladder – a Henry James website
A collection of eTexts of the tales, novels, plays, and prefaces – with links to available free eTexts at Project Gutenberg and elsewhere.

A Hyper-Concordance to the Works
Japanese-based online research tool that locates the use of any word or phrase in context. Find that illusive quotable phrase.

The Henry James Resource Center
A web site with biography, bibliographies, adaptations, archival resources, suggested reading, and recent scholarship.

Online Books Page
A collection of online texts, including novels, stories, travel writing, literary criticism, and letters.

Henry James at Project Gutenberg
A major collection of eTexts, available in a variety of eBook formats.

The Complete Letters
Archive of the complete correspondence (1855-1878) work in progress – published by the University of Nebraska Press.

The Scholar’s Guide to Web Sites
An old-fashioned but major jumpstation – a website of websites and resouces.

Henry James – The Complete Tales
Tutorials on the complete collection of over one hundred tales, novellas, and short stories.

More tales by James
More on literature
More on the novella
More on literary studies
More on short stories

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tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

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tutorial, commentary, study resources, plot, and web links

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Master Eustace – study resources

Master Eustace – plot summary

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Henry James – web links

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