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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/723-h.zip b/723-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ea00a23 --- /dev/null +++ b/723-h.zip diff --git a/723-h/723-h.htm b/723-h/723-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f697933 --- /dev/null +++ b/723-h/723-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,821 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="us-ascii"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta content="pg2html (binary v0.17)" name="linklinkgenerator" /> + <title> + Henry James, Jr., by William Dean Howells + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + body { margin:15%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .75em; margin-bottom: .75em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%; text-align: justify; font-size: 80%; font-style: italic;} + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + .xx-small {font-size: 60%;} + .x-small {font-size: 75%;} + .small {font-size: 85%;} + .large {font-size: 115%;} + .x-large {font-size: 130%;} + .indent5 { margin-left: 5%;} + .indent10 { margin-left: 10%;} + .indent15 { margin-left: 15%;} + .indent20 { margin-left: 20%;} + .indent25 { margin-left: 25%;} + .indent30 { margin-left: 30%;} + .indent35 { margin-left: 35%;} + .indent40 { margin-left: 40%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {position: absolute; right: 1%; font-size: 0.6em; + font-variant: normal; font-style: normal; + text-align: right; background-color: #FFFACD; + border: 1px solid; padding: 0.3em;text-indent: 0em;} + .side { float: left; font-size: 75%; width: 15%; padding-left: 0.8em; + border-left: dashed thin; text-align: left; + text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; + font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} + .head { float: left; font-size: 90%; width: 98%; padding-left: 0.8em; + border-left: dashed thin; text-align: center; + text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; + font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} + p.pfirst, p.noindent {text-indent: 0} + span.dropcap { float: left; margin: 0 0.1em 0 0; line-height: 0.8 } + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Henry James, Jr., by William Dean Howells + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Henry James, Jr. + +Author: William Dean Howells + +Posting Date: July 23, 2008 [EBook #723] +Release Date: November, 1996 +Last Updated: August 26, 2018 + + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HENRY JAMES, JR. *** + + + + +Etext produced by Anthony J. Adam. + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + + + + + +</pre> + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + HENRY JAMES, JR. + </h1> + <h2> + By William Dean Howells + </h2> + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /> + <hr /> + <br /> + </div> + <p> + The events of Mr. James's life—as we agree to understand events—may + be told in a very few words. His race is Irish on his father's side and + Scotch on his mother's, to which mingled strains the generalizer may + attribute, if he likes, that union of vivid expression and dispassionate + analysis which has characterized his work from the first. There are none + of those early struggles with poverty, which render the lives of so many + distinguished Americans monotonous reading, to record in his case: the + cabin hearth-fire did not light him to the youthful pursuit of literature; + he had from the start all those advantages which, when they go too far, + become limitations. + </p> + <p> + He was born in New York city in the year 1843, and his first lessons in + life and letters were the best which the metropolis—so small in the + perspective diminishing to that date—could afford. In his twelfth + year his family went abroad, and after some stay in England made a long + sojourn in France and Switzerland. They returned to America in 1860, + placing themselves at Newport, and for a year or two Mr. James was at the + Harvard Law School, where, perhaps, he did not study a great deal of law. + His father removed from Newport to Cambridge in 1866, and there Mr. James + remained till he went abroad, three years later, for the residence in + England and Italy which, with infrequent visits home, has continued ever + since. + </p> + <p> + It was during these three years of his Cambridge life that I became + acquainted with his work. He had already printed a tale—"The Story + of a Year"—in the "Atlantic Monthly," when I was asked to be Mr. + Fields's assistant in the management, and it was my fortune to read Mr. + James's second contribution in manuscript. "Would you take it?" asked my + chief. "Yes, and all the stories you can get from the writer." One is much + securer of one's judgment at twenty-nine than, say, at forty-five; but if + this was a mistake of mine I am not yet old enough to regret it. The story + was called "Poor Richard," and it dealt with the conscience of a man very + much in love with a woman who loved his rival. He told this rival a lie, + which sent him away to his death on the field,—in that day nearly + every fictitious personage had something to do with the war,—but + Poor Richard's lie did not win him his love. It still seems to me that the + situation was strongly and finely felt. One's pity went, as it should, + with the liar; but the whole story had a pathos which lingers in my mind + equally with a sense of the new literary qualities which gave me such + delight in it. I admired, as we must in all that Mr. James has written, + the finished workmanship in which there is no loss of vigor; the luminous + and uncommon use of words, the originality of phrase, the whole clear and + beautiful style, which I confess I weakly liked the better for the + occasional gallicisms remaining from an inveterate habit of French. Those + who know the writings of Mr. Henry James will recognize the inherited + felicity of diction which is so striking in the writings of Mr. Henry + James, Jr. The son's diction is not so racy as the father's; it lacks its + daring, but it is as fortunate and graphic; and I cannot give it greater + praise than this, though it has, when he will, a splendor and state which + is wholly its own. + </p> + <p> + Mr. James is now so universally recognized that I shall seem to be making + an unwarrantable claim when I express my belief that the popularity of his + stories was once largely confined to Mr. Field's assistant. They had + characteristics which forbade any editor to refuse them; and there are no + anecdotes of thrice-rejected manuscripts finally printed to tell of him; + his work was at once successful with all the magazines. But with the + readers of "The Atlantic," of "Harper's," of "Lippincott's," of "The + Galaxy," of "The Century," it was another affair. The flavor was so + strange, that, with rare exceptions, they had to "learn to like" it. + Probably few writers have in the same degree compelled the liking of their + readers. He was reluctantly accepted, partly through a mistake as to his + attitude—through the confusion of his point of view with his private + opinion—in the reader's mind. This confusion caused the tears of + rage which bedewed our continent in behalf of the "average American girl" + supposed to be satirized in Daisy Miller, and prevented the perception of + the fact that, so far as the average American girl was studied at all in + Daisy Miller, her indestructible innocence, her invulnerable + new-worldliness, had never been so delicately appreciated. It was so plain + that Mr. James disliked her vulgar conditions, that the very people to + whom he revealed her essential sweetness and light were furious that he + should have seemed not to see what existed through him. In other words, + they would have liked him better if he had been a worse artist—if he + had been a little more confidential. + </p> + <p> + But that artistic impartiality which puzzled so many in the treatment of + Daisy Miller is one of the qualities most valuable in the eyes of those + who care how things are done, and I am not sure that it is not Mr. James's + most characteristic quality. As "frost performs the effect of fire," this + impartiality comes at last to the same result as sympathy. We may be quite + sure that Mr. James does not like the peculiar phase of our civilization + typified in Henrietta Stackpole; but he treats her with such exquisite + justice that he lets US like her. It is an extreme case, but I confidently + allege it in proof. + </p> + <p> + His impartiality is part of the reserve with which he works in most + respects, and which at first glance makes us say that he is wanting in + humor. But I feel pretty certain that Mr. James has not been able to + disinherit himself to this degree. We Americans are terribly in earnest + about making ourselves, individually and collectively; but I fancy that + our prevailing mood in the face of all problems is that of an abiding + faith which can afford to be funny. He has himself indicated that we have, + as a nation, as a people, our joke, and every one of us is in the joke + more or less. We may, some of us, dislike it extremely, disapprove it + wholly, and even abhor it, but we are in the joke all the same, and no one + of us is safe from becoming the great American humorist at any given + moment. The danger is not apparent in Mr. James's case, and I confess that + I read him with a relief in the comparative immunity that he affords from + the national facetiousness. Many of his people are humorously imagined, or + rather humorously SEEN, like Daisy Miller's mother, but these do not give + a dominant color; the business in hand is commonly serious, and the droll + people are subordinated. They abound, nevertheless, and many of them are + perfectly new finds, like Mr. Tristram in "The American," the bill-paying + father in the "Pension Beaurepas," the anxiously Europeanizing mother in + the same story, the amusing little Madame de Belgarde, Henrietta + Stackpole, and even Newman himself. But though Mr. James portrays the + humorous in character, he is decidedly not on humorous terms with his + reader; he ignores rather than recognizes the fact that they are both in + the joke. + </p> + <p> + If we take him at all we must take him on his own ground, for clearly he + will not come to ours. We must make concessions to him, not in this + respect only, but in several others, chief among which is the motive for + reading fiction. By example, at least, he teaches that it is the pursuit + and not the end which should give us pleasure; for he often prefers to + leave us to our own conjectures in regard to the fate of the people in + whom he has interested us. There is no question, of course, but he could + tell the story of Isabel in "The Portrait of a Lady" to the end, yet he + does not tell it. We must agree, then, to take what seems a fragment + instead of a whole, and to find, when we can, a name for this new kind in + fiction. Evidently it is the character, not the fate, of his people which + occupies him; when he has fully developed their character he leaves them + to what destiny the reader pleases. + </p> + <p> + The analytic tendency seems to have increased with him as his work has + gone on. Some of the earlier tales were very dramatic: "A Passionate + Pilgrim," which I should rank above all his other short stories, and for + certain rich poetical qualities, above everything else that he has done, + is eminently dramatic. But I do not find much that I should call dramatic + in "The Portrait of a Lady," while I do find in it an amount of analysis + which I should call superabundance if it were not all such good + literature. The novelist's main business is to possess his reader with a + due conception of his characters and the situations in which they find + themselves. If he does more or less than this he equally fails. I have + sometimes thought that Mr. James's danger was to do more, but when I have + been ready to declare this excess an error of his method I have hesitated. + Could anything be superfluous that had given me so much pleasure as I + read? Certainly from only one point of view, and this a rather narrow, + technical one. It seems to me that an enlightened criticism will recognize + in Mr. James's fiction a metaphysical genius working to aesthetic results, + and will not be disposed to deny it any method it chooses to employ. No + other novelist, except George Eliot, has dealt so largely in analysis of + motive, has so fully explained and commented upon the springs of action in + the persons of the drama, both before and after the facts. These novelists + are more alike than any others in their processes, but with George Eliot + an ethical purpose is dominant, and with Mr. James an artistic purpose. I + do not know just how it should be stated of two such noble and generous + types of character as Dorothea and Isabel Archer, but I think that we + sympathize with the former in grand aims that chiefly concern others, and + with the latter in beautiful dreams that primarily concern herself. Both + are unselfish and devoted women, sublimely true to a mistaken ideal in + their marriages; but, though they come to this common martyrdom, the + original difference in them remains. Isabel has her great weaknesses, as + Dorothea had, but these seem to me, on the whole, the most nobly imagined + and the most nobly intentioned women in modern fiction; and I think Isabel + is the more subtly divined of the two. If we speak of mere + characterization, we must not fail to acknowledge the perfection of + Gilbert Osmond. It was a profound stroke to make him an American by birth. + No European could realize so fully in his own life the ideal of a European + dilettante in all the meaning of that cheapened word; as no European could + so deeply and tenderly feel the sweetness and loveliness of the English + past as the sick American, Searle, in "The Passionate Pilgrim." + </p> + <p> + What is called the international novel is popularly dated from the + publication of "Daisy Miller," though "Roderick Hudson" and "The American" + had gone before; but it really began in the beautiful story which I have + just named. Mr. James, who invented this species in fiction, first + contrasted in the "Passionate Pilgrim" the New World and Old World moods, + ideals, and prejudices, and he did it there with a richness of poetic + effect which he has since never equalled. I own that I regret the loss of + the poetry, but you cannot ask a man to keep on being a poet for you; it + is hardly for him to choose; yet I compare rather discontentedly in my own + mind such impassioned creations as Searle and the painter in "The Madonna + of the Future" with "Daisy Miller," of whose slight, thin personality I + also feel the indefinable charm, and of the tragedy of whose innocence I + recognize the delicate pathos. Looking back to those early stories, where + Mr. James stood at the dividing ways of the novel and the romance, I am + sometimes sorry that he declared even superficially for the former. His + best efforts seem to me those of romance; his best types have an ideal + development, like Isabel and Claire Belgarde and Bessy Alden and poor + Daisy and even Newman. But, doubtless, he has chosen wisely; perhaps the + romance is an outworn form, and would not lend itself to the reproduction + of even the ideality of modern life. I myself waver somewhat in my + preference—if it is a preference—when I think of such people + as Lord Warburton and the Touchetts, whom I take to be all decidedly of + this world. The first of these especially interested me as a probable type + of the English nobleman, who amiably accepts the existing situation with + all its possibilities of political and social change, and insists not at + all upon the surviving feudalities, but means to be a manly and simple + gentleman in any event. An American is not able to pronounce as to the + verity of the type; I only know that it seems probable and that it is + charming. It makes one wish that it were in Mr. James's way to paint in + some story the present phase of change in England. A titled personage is + still mainly an inconceivable being to us; he is like a goblin or a fairy + in a storybook. How does he comport himself in the face of all the changes + and modifications that have taken place and that still impend? We can + hardly imagine a lord taking his nobility seriously; it is some hint of + the conditional frame of Lord Warburton's mind that makes him imaginable + and delightful to us. + </p> + <p> + It is not my purpose here to review any of Mr. James's books; I like + better to speak of his people than of the conduct of his novels, and I + wish to recognize the fineness with which he has touched-in the pretty + primness of Osmond's daughter and the mild devotedness of Mr. Rosier. A + masterly hand is as often manifest in the treatment of such subordinate + figures as in that of the principal persons, and Mr. James does them + unerringly. This is felt in the more important character of Valentin + Belgarde, a fascinating character in spite of its defects,—perhaps + on account of them—and a sort of French Lord Warburton, but wittier, + and not so good. "These are my ideas," says his sister-in-law, at the end + of a number of inanities. "Ah, you call them ideas!" he returns, which is + delicious and makes you love him. He, too, has his moments of misgiving, + apparently in regard to his nobility, and his acceptance of Newman on the + basis of something like "manhood suffrage" is very charming. It is of + course difficult for a remote plebeian to verify the pictures of + legitimist society in "The American," but there is the probable suggestion + in them of conditions and principles, and want of principles, of which we + get glimpses in our travels abroad; at any rate, they reveal another and + not impossible world, and it is fine to have Newman discover that the + opinions and criticisms of our world are so absolutely valueless in that + sphere that his knowledge of the infamous crime of the mother and brother + of his betrothed will have no effect whatever upon them in their own + circle if he explodes it there. This seems like aristocracy indeed! and + one admires, almost respects, its survival in our day. But I always + regretted that Newman's discovery seemed the precursor of his magnanimous + resolution not to avenge himself; it weakened the effect of this, with + which it had really nothing to do. Upon the whole, however, Newman is an + adequate and satisfying representative of Americanism, with his generous + matrimonial ambition, his vast good-nature, and his thorough good sense + and right feeling. We must be very hard to please if we are not pleased + with him. He is not the "cultivated American" who redeems us from time to + time in the eyes of Europe; but he is unquestionably more national, and it + is observable that his unaffected fellow-countrymen and women fare very + well at Mr. James's hand always; it is the Europeanizing sort like the + critical little Bostonian in the "Bundle of Letters," the ladies shocked + at Daisy Miller, the mother in the "Pension Beaurepas" who goes about + trying to be of the "native" world everywhere, Madame Merle and Gilbert + Osmond, Miss Light and her mother, who have reason to complain, if any one + has. Doubtless Mr. James does not mean to satirize such Americans, but it + is interesting to note how they strike such a keen observer. We are + certainly not allowed to like them, and the other sort find somehow a + place in our affections along with his good Europeans. It is a little odd, + by the way, that in all the printed talk about Mr. James—and there + has been no end of it—his power of engaging your preference for + certain of his people has been so little commented on. Perhaps it is + because he makes no obvious appeal for them; but one likes such men as + Lord Warburton, Newman, Valentin, the artistic brother in "The Europeans," + and Ralph Touchett, and such women as Isabel, Claire Belgarde, Mrs. + Tristram, and certain others, with a thoroughness that is one of the best + testimonies to their vitality. This comes about through their own + qualities, and is not affected by insinuation or by downright petting, + such as we find in Dickens nearly always and in Thackeray too often. + </p> + <p> + The art of fiction has, in fact, become a finer art in our day than it was + with Dickens and Thackeray. We could not suffer the confidential attitude + of the latter now, nor the mannerism of the former, any more than we could + endure the prolixity of Richardson or the coarseness of Fielding. These + great men are of the past—they and their methods and interests; even + Trollope and Reade are not of the present. The new school derives from + Hawthorne and George Eliot rather than any others; but it studies human + nature much more in its wonted aspects, and finds its ethical and dramatic + examples in the operation of lighter but not really less vital motives. + The moving accident is certainly not its trade; and it prefers to avoid + all manner of dire catastrophes. It is largely influenced by French + fiction in form; but it is the realism of Daudet rather than the realism + of Zola that prevails with it, and it has a soul of its own which is above + the business of recording the rather brutish pursuit of a woman by a man, + which seems to be the chief end of the French novelist. This school, which + is so largely of the future as well as the present, finds its chief + exemplar in Mr. James; it is he who is shaping and directing American + fiction, at least. It is the ambition of the younger contributors to write + like him; he has his following more distinctly recognizable than that of + any other English-writing novelist. Whether he will so far control this + following as to decide the nature of the novel with us remains to be seen. + Will the reader be content to accept a novel which is an analytic study + rather than a story, which is apt to leave him arbiter of the destiny of + the author's creations? Will he find his account in the unflagging + interest of their development? Mr. James's growing popularity seems to + suggest that this may be the case; but the work of Mr. James's imitators + will have much to do with the final result. + </p> + <p> + In the meantime it is not surprising that he has his imitators. Whatever + exceptions we take to his methods or his results, we cannot deny him a + very great literary genius. To me there is a perpetual delight in his way + of saying things, and I cannot wonder that younger men try to catch the + trick of it. The disappointing thing for them is that it is not a trick, + but an inherent virtue. His style is, upon the whole, better than that of + any other novelist I know; it is always easy, without being trivial, and + it is often stately, without being stiff; it gives a charm to everything + he writes; and he has written so much and in such various directions, that + we should be judging him very incompletely if we considered him only as a + novelist. His book of European sketches must rank him with the most + enlightened and agreeable travelers; and it might be fitly supplemented + from his uncollected papers with a volume of American sketches. In his + essays on modern French writers he indicates his critical range and grasp; + but he scarcely does more, as his criticisms in "The Atlantic" and "The + Nation" and elsewhere could abundantly testify. + </p> + <p> + There are indeed those who insist that criticism is his true vocation, and + are impatient of his devotion to fiction; but I suspect that these + admirers are mistaken. A novelists he is not, after the old fashion, or + after any fashion but his own; yet since he has finally made his public in + his own way of story-telling—or call it character-painting if you + prefer,—it must be conceded that he has chosen best for himself and + his readers in choosing the form of fiction for what he has to say. It is, + after all, what a writer has to say rather than what he has to tell that + we care for nowadays. In one manner or other the stories were all told + long ago; and now we want merely to know what the novelist thinks about + persons and situations. Mr. James gratifies this philosophic desire. If he + sometimes forbears to tell us what he thinks of the last state of his + people, it is perhaps because that does not interest him, and a + large-minded criticism might well insist that it was childish to demand + that it must interest him. + </p> + <p> + I am not sure that any criticism is sufficiently large-minded for this. I + own that I like a finished story; but then also I like those which Mr. + James seems not to finish. This is probably the position of most of his + readers, who cannot very logically account for either preference. We can + only make sure that we have here an annalist, or analyst, as we choose, + who fascinates us from his first page to his last, whose narrative or + whose comment may enter into any minuteness of detail without fatiguing + us, and can only truly grieve us when it ceases. + </p> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Henry James, Jr., by William Dean Howells + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HENRY JAMES, JR. *** + +***** This file should be named 723-h.htm or 723-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/7/2/723/ + +Etext produced by Anthony J. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Henry James, Jr. + +Author: William Dean Howells + +Posting Date: July 23, 2008 [EBook #723] +Release Date: November, 1996 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HENRY JAMES, JR. *** + + + + +Produced by Anthony J. Adam. + + + + + + + + +HENRY JAMES, JR. + +by + +William Dean Howells + + + +The events of Mr. James's life--as we agree to understand events--may +be told in a very few words. His race is Irish on his father's side +and Scotch on his mother's, to which mingled strains the generalizer +may attribute, if he likes, that union of vivid expression and +dispassionate analysis which has characterized his work from the first. +There are none of those early struggles with poverty, which render the +lives of so many distinguished Americans monotonous reading, to record +in his case: the cabin hearth-fire did not light him to the youthful +pursuit of literature; he had from the start all those advantages +which, when they go too far, become limitations. + +He was born in New York city in the year 1843, and his first lessons in +life and letters were the best which the metropolis--so small in the +perspective diminishing to that date--could afford. In his twelfth +year his family went abroad, and after some stay in England made a long +sojourn in France and Switzerland. They returned to America in 1860, +placing themselves at Newport, and for a year or two Mr. James was at +the Harvard Law School, where, perhaps, he did not study a great deal +of law. His father removed from Newport to Cambridge in 1866, and +there Mr. James remained till he went abroad, three years later, for +the residence in England and Italy which, with infrequent visits home, +has continued ever since. + +It was during these three years of his Cambridge life that I became +acquainted with his work. He had already printed a tale--"The Story of +a Year"--in the "Atlantic Monthly," when I was asked to be Mr. Fields's +assistant in the management, and it was my fortune to read Mr. James's +second contribution in manuscript. "Would you take it?" asked my +chief. "Yes, and all the stories you can get from the writer." One is +much securer of one's judgment at twenty-nine than, say, at forty-five; +but if this was a mistake of mine I am not yet old enough to regret it. +The story was called "Poor Richard," and it dealt with the conscience +of a man very much in love with a woman who loved his rival. He told +this rival a lie, which sent him away to his death on the field,--in +that day nearly every fictitious personage had something to do with the +war,--but Poor Richard's lie did not win him his love. It still seems +to me that the situation was strongly and finely felt. One's pity +went, as it should, with the liar; but the whole story had a pathos +which lingers in my mind equally with a sense of the new literary +qualities which gave me such delight in it. I admired, as we must in +all that Mr. James has written, the finished workmanship in which there +is no loss of vigor; the luminous and uncommon use of words, the +originality of phrase, the whole clear and beautiful style, which I +confess I weakly liked the better for the occasional gallicisms +remaining from an inveterate habit of French. Those who know the +writings of Mr. Henry James will recognize the inherited felicity of +diction which is so striking in the writings of Mr. Henry James, Jr. +The son's diction is not so racy as the father's; it lacks its daring, +but it is as fortunate and graphic; and I cannot give it greater praise +than this, though it has, when he will, a splendor and state which is +wholly its own. + +Mr. James is now so universally recognized that I shall seem to be +making an unwarrantable claim when I express my belief that the +popularity of his stories was once largely confined to Mr. Field's +assistant. They had characteristics which forbade any editor to refuse +them; and there are no anecdotes of thrice-rejected manuscripts finally +printed to tell of him; his work was at once successful with all the +magazines. But with the readers of "The Atlantic," of "Harper's," of +"Lippincott's," of "The Galaxy," of "The Century," it was another +affair. The flavor was so strange, that, with rare exceptions, they +had to "learn to like" it. Probably few writers have in the same +degree compelled the liking of their readers. He was reluctantly +accepted, partly through a mistake as to his attitude--through the +confusion of his point of view with his private opinion--in the +reader's mind. This confusion caused the tears of rage which bedewed +our continent in behalf of the "average American girl" supposed to be +satirized in Daisy Miller, and prevented the perception of the fact +that, so far as the average American girl was studied at all in Daisy +Miller, her indestructible innocence, her invulnerable new-worldliness, +had never been so delicately appreciated. It was so plain that Mr. +James disliked her vulgar conditions, that the very people to whom he +revealed her essential sweetness and light were furious that he should +have seemed not to see what existed through him. In other words, they +would have liked him better if he had been a worse artist--if he had +been a little more confidential. + +But that artistic impartiality which puzzled so many in the treatment +of Daisy Miller is one of the qualities most valuable in the eyes of +those who care how things are done, and I am not sure that it is not +Mr. James's most characteristic quality. As "frost performs the effect +of fire," this impartiality comes at last to the same result as +sympathy. We may be quite sure that Mr. James does not like the +peculiar phase of our civilization typified in Henrietta Stackpole; but +he treats her with such exquisite justice that he lets US like her. It +is an extreme case, but I confidently allege it in proof. + +His impartiality is part of the reserve with which he works in most +respects, and which at first glance makes us say that he is wanting in +humor. But I feel pretty certain that Mr. James has not been able to +disinherit himself to this degree. We Americans are terribly in +earnest about making ourselves, individually and collectively; but I +fancy that our prevailing mood in the face of all problems is that of +an abiding faith which can afford to be funny. He has himself +indicated that we have, as a nation, as a people, our joke, and every +one of us is in the joke more or less. We may, some of us, dislike it +extremely, disapprove it wholly, and even abhor it, but we are in the +joke all the same, and no one of us is safe from becoming the great +American humorist at any given moment. The danger is not apparent in +Mr. James's case, and I confess that I read him with a relief in the +comparative immunity that he affords from the national facetiousness. +Many of his people are humorously imagined, or rather humorously SEEN, +like Daisy Miller's mother, but these do not give a dominant color; the +business in hand is commonly serious, and the droll people are +subordinated. They abound, nevertheless, and many of them are +perfectly new finds, like Mr. Tristram in "The American," the +bill-paying father in the "Pension Beaurepas," the anxiously +Europeanizing mother in the same story, the amusing little Madame de +Belgarde, Henrietta Stackpole, and even Newman himself. But though Mr. +James portrays the humorous in character, he is decidedly not on +humorous terms with his reader; he ignores rather than recognizes the +fact that they are both in the joke. + +If we take him at all we must take him on his own ground, for clearly +he will not come to ours. We must make concessions to him, not in this +respect only, but in several others, chief among which is the motive +for reading fiction. By example, at least, he teaches that it is the +pursuit and not the end which should give us pleasure; for he often +prefers to leave us to our own conjectures in regard to the fate of the +people in whom he has interested us. There is no question, of course, +but he could tell the story of Isabel in "The Portrait of a Lady" to +the end, yet he does not tell it. We must agree, then, to take what +seems a fragment instead of a whole, and to find, when we can, a name +for this new kind in fiction. Evidently it is the character, not the +fate, of his people which occupies him; when he has fully developed +their character he leaves them to what destiny the reader pleases. + +The analytic tendency seems to have increased with him as his work has +gone on. Some of the earlier tales were very dramatic: "A Passionate +Pilgrim," which I should rank above all his other short stories, and +for certain rich poetical qualities, above everything else that he has +done, is eminently dramatic. But I do not find much that I should call +dramatic in "The Portrait of a Lady," while I do find in it an amount +of analysis which I should call superabundance if it were not all such +good literature. The novelist's main business is to possess his reader +with a due conception of his characters and the situations in which +they find themselves. If he does more or less than this he equally +fails. I have sometimes thought that Mr. James's danger was to do +more, but when I have been ready to declare this excess an error of his +method I have hesitated. Could anything be superfluous that had given +me so much pleasure as I read? Certainly from only one point of view, +and this a rather narrow, technical one. It seems to me that an +enlightened criticism will recognize in Mr. James's fiction a +metaphysical genius working to aesthetic results, and will not be +disposed to deny it any method it chooses to employ. No other +novelist, except George Eliot, has dealt so largely in analysis of +motive, has so fully explained and commented upon the springs of action +in the persons of the drama, both before and after the facts. These +novelists are more alike than any others in their processes, but with +George Eliot an ethical purpose is dominant, and with Mr. James an +artistic purpose. I do not know just how it should be stated of two +such noble and generous types of character as Dorothea and Isabel +Archer, but I think that we sympathize with the former in grand aims +that chiefly concern others, and with the latter in beautiful dreams +that primarily concern herself. Both are unselfish and devoted women, +sublimely true to a mistaken ideal in their marriages; but, though they +come to this common martyrdom, the original difference in them remains. +Isabel has her great weaknesses, as Dorothea had, but these seem to me, +on the whole, the most nobly imagined and the most nobly intentioned +women in modern fiction; and I think Isabel is the more subtly divined +of the two. If we speak of mere characterization, we must not fail to +acknowledge the perfection of Gilbert Osmond. It was a profound stroke +to make him an American by birth. No European could realize so fully +in his own life the ideal of a European dilettante in all the meaning +of that cheapened word; as no European could so deeply and tenderly +feel the sweetness and loveliness of the English past as the sick +American, Searle, in "The Passionate Pilgrim." + +What is called the international novel is popularly dated from the +publication of "Daisy Miller," though "Roderick Hudson" and "The +American" had gone before; but it really began in the beautiful story +which I have just named. Mr. James, who invented this species in +fiction, first contrasted in the "Passionate Pilgrim" the New World and +Old World moods, ideals, and prejudices, and he did it there with a +richness of poetic effect which he has since never equalled. I own +that I regret the loss of the poetry, but you cannot ask a man to keep +on being a poet for you; it is hardly for him to choose; yet I compare +rather discontentedly in my own mind such impassioned creations as +Searle and the painter in "The Madonna of the Future" with "Daisy +Miller," of whose slight, thin personality I also feel the indefinable +charm, and of the tragedy of whose innocence I recognize the delicate +pathos. Looking back to those early stories, where Mr. James stood at +the dividing ways of the novel and the romance, I am sometimes sorry +that he declared even superficially for the former. His best efforts +seem to me those of romance; his best types have an ideal development, +like Isabel and Claire Belgarde and Bessy Alden and poor Daisy and even +Newman. But, doubtless, he has chosen wisely; perhaps the romance is +an outworn form, and would not lend itself to the reproduction of even +the ideality of modern life. I myself waver somewhat in my +preference--if it is a preference--when I think of such people as Lord +Warburton and the Touchetts, whom I take to be all decidedly of this +world. The first of these especially interested me as a probable type +of the English nobleman, who amiably accepts the existing situation +with all its possibilities of political and social change, and insists +not at all upon the surviving feudalities, but means to be a manly and +simple gentleman in any event. An American is not able to pronounce as +to the verity of the type; I only know that it seems probable and that +it is charming. It makes one wish that it were in Mr. James's way to +paint in some story the present phase of change in England. A titled +personage is still mainly an inconceivable being to us; he is like a +goblin or a fairy in a storybook. How does he comport himself in the +face of all the changes and modifications that have taken place and +that still impend? We can hardly imagine a lord taking his nobility +seriously; it is some hint of the conditional frame of Lord Warburton's +mind that makes him imaginable and delightful to us. + +It is not my purpose here to review any of Mr. James's books; I like +better to speak of his people than of the conduct of his novels, and I +wish to recognize the fineness with which he has touched-in the pretty +primness of Osmond's daughter and the mild devotedness of Mr. Rosier. +A masterly hand is as often manifest in the treatment of such +subordinate figures as in that of the principal persons, and Mr. James +does them unerringly. This is felt in the more important character of +Valentin Belgarde, a fascinating character in spite of its +defects,--perhaps on account of them--and a sort of French Lord +Warburton, but wittier, and not so good. "These are my ideas," says +his sister-in-law, at the end of a number of inanities. "Ah, you call +them ideas!" he returns, which is delicious and makes you love him. +He, too, has his moments of misgiving, apparently in regard to his +nobility, and his acceptance of Newman on the basis of something like +"manhood suffrage" is very charming. It is of course difficult for a +remote plebeian to verify the pictures of legitimist society in "The +American," but there is the probable suggestion in them of conditions +and principles, and want of principles, of which we get glimpses in our +travels abroad; at any rate, they reveal another and not impossible +world, and it is fine to have Newman discover that the opinions and +criticisms of our world are so absolutely valueless in that sphere that +his knowledge of the infamous crime of the mother and brother of his +betrothed will have no effect whatever upon them in their own circle if +he explodes it there. This seems like aristocracy indeed! and one +admires, almost respects, its survival in our day. But I always +regretted that Newman's discovery seemed the precursor of his +magnanimous resolution not to avenge himself; it weakened the effect of +this, with which it had really nothing to do. Upon the whole, however, +Newman is an adequate and satisfying representative of Americanism, +with his generous matrimonial ambition, his vast good-nature, and his +thorough good sense and right feeling. We must be very hard to please +if we are not pleased with him. He is not the "cultivated American" +who redeems us from time to time in the eyes of Europe; but he is +unquestionably more national, and it is observable that his unaffected +fellow-countrymen and women fare very well at Mr. James's hand always; +it is the Europeanizing sort like the critical little Bostonian in the +"Bundle of Letters," the ladies shocked at Daisy Miller, the mother in +the "Pension Beaurepas" who goes about trying to be of the "native" +world everywhere, Madame Merle and Gilbert Osmond, Miss Light and her +mother, who have reason to complain, if any one has. Doubtless Mr. +James does not mean to satirize such Americans, but it is interesting +to note how they strike such a keen observer. We are certainly not +allowed to like them, and the other sort find somehow a place in our +affections along with his good Europeans. It is a little odd, by the +way, that in all the printed talk about Mr. James--and there has been +no end of it--his power of engaging your preference for certain of his +people has been so little commented on. Perhaps it is because he makes +no obvious appeal for them; but one likes such men as Lord Warburton, +Newman, Valentin, the artistic brother in "The Europeans," and Ralph +Touchett, and such women as Isabel, Claire Belgarde, Mrs. Tristram, and +certain others, with a thoroughness that is one of the best testimonies +to their vitality. This comes about through their own qualities, and +is not affected by insinuation or by downright petting, such as we find +in Dickens nearly always and in Thackeray too often. + +The art of fiction has, in fact, become a finer art in our day than it +was with Dickens and Thackeray. We could not suffer the confidential +attitude of the latter now, nor the mannerism of the former, any more +than we could endure the prolixity of Richardson or the coarseness of +Fielding. These great men are of the past--they and their methods and +interests; even Trollope and Reade are not of the present. The new +school derives from Hawthorne and George Eliot rather than any others; +but it studies human nature much more in its wonted aspects, and finds +its ethical and dramatic examples in the operation of lighter but not +really less vital motives. The moving accident is certainly not its +trade; and it prefers to avoid all manner of dire catastrophes. It is +largely influenced by French fiction in form; but it is the realism of +Daudet rather than the realism of Zola that prevails with it, and it +has a soul of its own which is above the business of recording the +rather brutish pursuit of a woman by a man, which seems to be the chief +end of the French novelist. This school, which is so largely of the +future as well as the present, finds its chief exemplar in Mr. James; +it is he who is shaping and directing American fiction, at least. It +is the ambition of the younger contributors to write like him; he has +his following more distinctly recognizable than that of any other +English-writing novelist. Whether he will so far control this +following as to decide the nature of the novel with us remains to be +seen. Will the reader be content to accept a novel which is an +analytic study rather than a story, which is apt to leave him arbiter +of the destiny of the author's creations? Will he find his account in +the unflagging interest of their development? Mr. James's growing +popularity seems to suggest that this may be the case; but the work of +Mr. James's imitators will have much to do with the final result. + +In the meantime it is not surprising that he has his imitators. +Whatever exceptions we take to his methods or his results, we cannot +deny him a very great literary genius. To me there is a perpetual +delight in his way of saying things, and I cannot wonder that younger +men try to catch the trick of it. The disappointing thing for them is +that it is not a trick, but an inherent virtue. His style is, upon the +whole, better than that of any other novelist I know; it is always +easy, without being trivial, and it is often stately, without being +stiff; it gives a charm to everything he writes; and he has written so +much and in such various directions, that we should be judging him very +incompletely if we considered him only as a novelist. His book of +European sketches must rank him with the most enlightened and agreeable +travelers; and it might be fitly supplemented from his uncollected +papers with a volume of American sketches. In his essays on modern +French writers he indicates his critical range and grasp; but he +scarcely does more, as his criticisms in "The Atlantic" and "The +Nation" and elsewhere could abundantly testify. + +There are indeed those who insist that criticism is his true vocation, +and are impatient of his devotion to fiction; but I suspect that these +admirers are mistaken. A novelists he is not, after the old fashion, +or after any fashion but his own; yet since he has finally made his +public in his own way of story-telling--or call it character-painting +if you prefer,--it must be conceded that he has chosen best for himself +and his readers in choosing the form of fiction for what he has to say. +It is, after all, what a writer has to say rather than what he has to +tell that we care for nowadays. In one manner or other the stories +were all told long ago; and now we want merely to know what the +novelist thinks about persons and situations. Mr. James gratifies this +philosophic desire. If he sometimes forbears to tell us what he thinks +of the last state of his people, it is perhaps because that does not +interest him, and a large-minded criticism might well insist that it +was childish to demand that it must interest him. + +I am not sure that any criticism is sufficiently large-minded for this. +I own that I like a finished story; but then also I like those which +Mr. James seems not to finish. This is probably the position of most +of his readers, who cannot very logically account for either +preference. We can only make sure that we have here an annalist, or +analyst, as we choose, who fascinates us from his first page to his +last, whose narrative or whose comment may enter into any minuteness of +detail without fatiguing us, and can only truly grieve us when it +ceases. + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Henry James, Jr., by William Dean Howells + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HENRY JAMES, JR. *** + +***** This file should be named 723.txt or 723.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/7/2/723/ + +Produced by Anthony J. Adam. + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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His race is Irish on +his father's side and Scotch on his mother's, to which mingled +strains the generalizer may attribute, if he likes, that union of +vivid expression and dispassionate analysis which has +characterized his work from the first. There are none of those +early struggles with poverty, which render the lives of so many +distinguished Americans monotonous reading, to record in his +case: the cabin hearth-fire did not light him to the youthful +pursuit of literature; he had from the start all those advantages +which, when they go too far, become limitations. + +He was born in New York city in the year 1843, and his first +lessons in life and letters were the best which the +metropolis--so small in the perspective diminishing to that +date--could afford. In his twelfth year his family went abroad, +and after some stay in England made a long sojourn in France and +Switzerland. They returned to America in 1860, placing +themselves at Newport, and for a year or two Mr. James was at the +Harvard Law School, where, perhaps, he did not study a great deal +of law. His father removed from Newport to Cambridge in 1866, +and there Mr. James remained till he went abroad, three years +later, for the residence in England and Italy which, with +infrequent visits home, has continued ever since. + +It was during these three years of his Cambridge life that I +became acquainted with his work. He had already printed a +tale--"The Story of a Year"--in the "Atlantic Monthly," when I +was asked to be Mr. Fields's assistant in the management, and it +was my fortune to read Mr. James's second contribution in +manuscript. "Would you take it?" asked my chief. "Yes, and all +the stories you can get from the writer." One is much securer of +one's judgment at twenty-nine than, say, at forty-five; but if +this was a mistake of mine I am not yet old enough to regret it. +The story was called "Poor Richard," and it dealt with the +conscience of a man very much in love with a woman who loved his +rival. He told this rival a lie, which sent him away to his +death on the field,--in that day nearly every fictitious +personage had something to do with the war,--but Poor Richard's +lie did not win him his love. It still seems to me that the +situation was strongly and finely felt. One's pity went, as it +should, with the liar; but the whole story had a pathos which +lingers in my mind equally with a sense of the new literary +qualities which gave me such delight in it. I admired, as we +must in all that Mr. James has written, the finished workmanship +in which there is no loss of vigor; the luminous and uncommon use +of words, the originality of phrase, the whole clear and +beautiful style, which I confess I weakly liked the better for +the occasional gallicisms remaining from an inveterate habit of +French. Those who know the writings of Mr. Henry James will +recognize the inherited felicity of diction which is so striking +in the writings of Mr. Henry James, Jr. The son's diction is not +so racy as the father's; it lacks its daring, but it is as +fortunate and graphic; and I cannot give it greater praise than +this, though it has, when he will, a splendor and state which is +wholly its own. + +Mr. James is now so universally recognized that I shall seem to +be making an unwarrantable claim when I express my belief that +the popularity of his stories was once largely confined to Mr. +Field's assistant. They had characteristics which forbade any +editor to refuse them; and there are no anecdotes of +thrice-rejected manuscripts finally printed to tell of him; his +work was at once successful with all the magazines. But with the +readers of "The Atlantic," of "Harper's," of "Lippincott's," of +"The Galaxy," of "The Century," it was another affair. The +flavor was so strange, that, with rare exceptions, they had to +"learn to like" it. Probably few writers have in the same degree +compelled the liking of their readers. He was reluctantly +accepted, partly through a mistake as to his attitude--through +the confusion of his point of view with his private opinion--in +the reader's mind. This confusion caused the tears of rage which +bedewed our continent in behalf of the "average American girl" +supposed to be satirized in Daisy Miller, and prevented the +perception of the fact that, so far as the average American girl +was studied at all in Daisy Miller, her indestructible innocence, +her invulnerable new-worldliness, had never been so delicately +appreciated. It was so plain that Mr. James disliked her vulgar +conditions, that the very people to whom he revealed her +essential sweetness and light were furious that he should have +seemed not to see what existed through him. In other words, they +would have liked him better if he had been a worse artist--if he +had been a little more confidential. + +But that artistic impartiality which puzzled so many in the +treatment of Daisy Miller is one of the qualities most valuable +in the eyes of those who care how things are done, and I am not +sure that it is not Mr. James's most characteristic quality. As +"frost performs the effect of fire," this impartiality comes at +last to the same result as sympathy. We may be quite sure that +Mr. James does not like the peculiar phase of our civilization +typified in Henrietta Stackpole; but he treats her with such +exquisite justice that he lets US like her. It is an extreme +case, but I confidently allege it in proof. + +His impartiality is part of the reserve with which he works in +most respects, and which at first glance makes us say that he is +wanting in humor. But I feel pretty certain that Mr. James has +not been able to disinherit himself to this degree. We Americans +are terribly in earnest about making ourselves, individually and +collectively; but I fancy that our prevailing mood in the face of +all problems is that of an abiding faith which can afford to be +funny. He has himself indicated that we have, as a nation, as a +people, our joke, and every one of us is in the joke more or +less. We may, some of us, dislike it extremely, disapprove it +wholly, and even abhor it, but we are in the joke all the same, +and no one of us is safe from becoming the great American +humorist at any given moment. The danger is not apparent in Mr. +James's case, and I confess that I read him with a relief in the +comparative immunity that he affords from the national +facetiousness. Many of his people are humorously imagined, or +rather humorously SEEN, like Daisy Miller's mother, but these do +not give a dominant color; the business in hand is commonly +serious, and the droll people are subordinated. They abound, +nevertheless, and many of them are perfectly new finds, like Mr. +Tristram in "The American," the bill-paying father in the +"Pension Beaurepas," the anxiously Europeanizing mother in the +same story, the amusing little Madame de Belgarde, Henrietta +Stackpole, and even Newman himself. But though Mr. James +portrays the humorous in character, he is decidedly not on +humorous terms with his reader; he ignores rather than recognizes +the fact that they are both in the joke. + +If we take him at all we must take him on his own ground, for +clearly he will not come to ours. We must make concessions to +him, not in this respect only, but in several others, chief among +which is the motive for reading fiction. By example, at least, +he teaches that it is the pursuit and not the end which should +give us pleasure; for he often prefers to leave us to our own +conjectures in regard to the fate of the people in whom he has +interested us. There is no question, of course, but he could +tell the story of Isabel in "The Portrait of a Lady" to the end, +yet he does not tell it. We must agree, then, to take what seems +a fragment instead of a whole, and to find, when we can, a name +for this new kind in fiction. Evidently it is the character, not +the fate, of his people which occupies him; when he has fully +developed their character he leaves them to what destiny the +reader pleases. + +The analytic tendency seems to have increased with him as his +work has gone on. Some of the earlier tales were very dramatic: +"A Passionate Pilgrim," which I should rank above all his other +short stories, and for certain rich poetical qualities, above +everything else that he has done, is eminently dramatic. But I +do not find much that I should call dramatic in "The Portrait of +a Lady," while I do find in it an amount of analysis which I +should call superabundance if it were not all such good +literature. The novelist's main business is to possess his +reader with a due conception of his characters and the situations +in which they find themselves. If he does more or less than this +he equally fails. I have sometimes thought that Mr. James's +danger was to do more, but when I have been ready to declare this +excess an error of his method I have hesitated. Could anything +be superfluous that had given me so much pleasure as I read? +Certainly from only one point of view, and this a rather narrow, +technical one. It seems to me that an enlightened criticism will +recognize in Mr. James's fiction a metaphysical genius working to +aesthetic results, and will not be disposed to deny it any method +it chooses to employ. No other novelist, except George Eliot, +has dealt so largely in analysis of motive, has so fully +explained and commented upon the springs of action in the persons +of the drama, both before and after the facts. These novelists +are more alike than any others in their processes, but with +George Eliot an ethical purpose is dominant, and with Mr. James +an artistic purpose. I do not know just how it should be stated +of two such noble and generous types of character as Dorothea and +Isabel Archer, but I think that we sympathize with the former in +grand aims that chiefly concern others, and with the latter in +beautiful dreams that primarily concern herself. Both are +unselfish and devoted women, sublimely true to a mistaken ideal +in their marriages; but, though they come to this common +martyrdom, the original difference in them remains. Isabel has +her great weaknesses, as Dorothea had, but these seem to me, on +the whole, the most nobly imagined and the most nobly intentioned +women in modern fiction; and I think Isabel is the more subtly +divined of the two. If we speak of mere characterization, we +must not fail to acknowledge the perfection of Gilbert Osmond. +It was a profound stroke to make him an American by birth. No +European could realize so fully in his own life the ideal of a +European dilettante in all the meaning of that cheapened word; as +no European could so deeply and tenderly feel the sweetness and +loveliness of the English past as the sick American, Searle, in +"The Passionate Pilgrim." + +What is called the international novel is popularly dated from +the publication of "Daisy Miller," though "Roderick Hudson" and +"The American" had gone before; but it really began in the +beautiful story which I have just named. Mr. James, who invented +this species in fiction, first contrasted in the "Passionate +Pilgrim" the New World and Old World moods, ideals, and +prejudices, and he did it there with a richness of poetic effect +which he has since never equalled. I own that I regret the loss +of the poetry, but you cannot ask a man to keep on being a poet +for you; it is hardly for him to choose; yet I compare rather +discontentedly in my own mind such impassioned creations as +Searle and the painter in "The Madonna of the Future" with "Daisy +Miller," of whose slight, thin personality I also feel the +indefinable charm, and of the tragedy of whose innocence I +recognize the delicate pathos. Looking back to those early +stories, where Mr. James stood at the dividing ways of the novel +and the romance, I am sometimes sorry that he declared even +superficially for the former. His best efforts seem to me those +of romance; his best types have an ideal development, like Isabel +and Claire Belgarde and Bessy Alden and poor Daisy and even +Newman. But, doubtless, he has chosen wisely; perhaps the +romance is an outworn form, and would not lend itself to the +reproduction of even the ideality of modern life. I myself waver +somewhat in my preference--if it is a preference--when I think of +such people as Lord Warburton and the Touchetts, whom I take to +be all decidedly of this world. The first of these especially +interested me as a probable type of the English nobleman, who +amiably accepts the existing situation with all its possibilities +of political and social change, and insists not at all upon the +surviving feudalities, but means to be a manly and simple +gentleman in any event. An American is not able to pronounce as +to the verity of the type; I only know that it seems probable and +that it is charming. It makes one wish that it were in Mr. +James's way to paint in some story the present phase of change in +England. A titled personage is still mainly an inconceivable +being to us; he is like a goblin or a fairy in a storybook. How +does he comport himself in the face of all the changes and +modifications that have taken place and that still impend? We +can hardly imagine a lord taking his nobility seriously; it is +some hint of the conditional frame of Lord Warburton's mind that +makes him imaginable and delightful to us. + +It is not my purpose here to review any of Mr. James's books; I +like better to speak of his people than of the conduct of his +novels, and I wish to recognize the fineness with which he has +touched-in the pretty primness of Osmond's daughter and the mild +devotedness of Mr. Rosier. A masterly hand is as often manifest +in the treatment of such subordinate figures as in that of the +principal persons, and Mr. James does them unerringly. This is +felt in the more important character of Valentin Belgarde, a +fascinating character in spite of its defects,--perhaps on +account of them--and a sort of French Lord Warburton, but +wittier, and not so good. "These are my ideas," says his +sister-in-law, at the end of a number of inanities. "Ah, you +call them ideas!" he returns, which is delicious and makes you +love him. He, too, has his moments of misgiving, apparently in +regard to his nobility, and his acceptance of Newman on the basis +of something like "manhood suffrage" is very charming. It is of +course difficult for a remote plebeian to verify the pictures of +legitimist society in "The American," but there is the probable +suggestion in them of conditions and principles, and want of +principles, of which we get glimpses in our travels abroad; at +any rate, they reveal another and not impossible world, and it is +fine to have Newman discover that the opinions and criticisms of +our world are so absolutely valueless in that sphere that his +knowledge of the infamous crime of the mother and brother of his +betrothed will have no effect whatever upon them in their own +circle if he explodes it there. This seems like aristocracy +indeed! and one admires, almost respects, its survival in our +day. But I always regretted that Newman's discovery seemed the +precursor of his magnanimous resolution not to avenge himself; it +weakened the effect of this, with which it had really nothing to +do. Upon the whole, however, Newman is an adequate and +satisfying representative of Americanism, with his generous +matrimonial ambition, his vast good-nature, and his thorough good +sense and right feeling. We must be very hard to please if we +are not pleased with him. He is not the "cultivated American" +who redeems us from time to time in the eyes of Europe; but he is +unquestionably more national, and it is observable that his +unaffected fellow-countrymen and women fare very well at Mr. +James's hand always; it is the Europeanizing sort like the +critical little Bostonian in the "Bundle of Letters," the ladies +shocked at Daisy Miller, the mother in the "Pension Beaurepas" +who goes about trying to be of the "native" world everywhere, +Madame Merle and Gilbert Osmond, Miss Light and her mother, who +have reason to complain, if any one has. Doubtless Mr. James +does not mean to satirize such Americans, but it is interesting +to note how they strike such a keen observer. We are certainly +not allowed to like them, and the other sort find somehow a place +in our affections along with his good Europeans. It is a little +odd, by the way, that in all the printed talk about Mr. +James--and there has been no end of it--his power of engaging +your preference for certain of his people has been so little +commented on. Perhaps it is because he makes no obvious appeal +for them; but one likes such men as Lord Warburton, Newman, +Valentin, the artistic brother in "The Europeans," and Ralph +Touchett, and such women as Isabel, Claire Belgarde, Mrs. +Tristram, and certain others, with a thoroughness that is one of +the best testimonies to their vitality. This comes about through +their own qualities, and is not affected by insinuation or by +downright petting, such as we find in Dickens nearly always and +in Thackeray too often. + +The art of fiction has, in fact, become a finer art in our day +than it was with Dickens and Thackeray. We could not suffer the +confidential attitude of the latter now, nor the mannerism of the +former, any more than we could endure the prolixity of Richardson +or the coarseness of Fielding. These great men are of the +past--they and their methods and interests; even Trollope and +Reade are not of the present. The new school derives from +Hawthorne and George Eliot rather than any others; but it studies +human nature much more in its wonted aspects, and finds its +ethical and dramatic examples in the operation of lighter but not +really less vital motives. The moving accident is certainly not +its trade; and it prefers to avoid all manner of dire +catastrophes. it is largely influenced by French fiction in +form; but it is the realism of Daudet rather than the realism of +Zola that prevails with it, and it has a soul of its own which is +above the business of recording the rather brutish pursuit of a +woman by a man, which seems to be the chief end of the French +novelist. This school, which is so largely of the future as well +as the present, finds its chief exemplar in Mr. James; it is he +who is shaping and directing American fiction, at least. It is +the ambition of the younger contributors to write like him; he +has his following more distinctly recognizable than that of any +other English-writing novelist. Whether he will so far control +this following as to decide the nature of the novel with us +remains to be seen. Will the reader be content to accept a novel +which is an analytic study rather than a story, which is apt to +leave him arbiter of the destiny of the author's creations? Will +he find his account in the unflagging interest of their +development? Mr. James's growing popularity seems to suggest +that this may be the case; but the work of Mr. James's imitators +will have much to do with the final result. + +In the meantime it is not surprising that he has his imitators. +Whatever exceptions we take to his methods or his results, we +cannot deny him a very great literary genius. To me there is a +perpetual delight in his way of saying things, and I cannot +wonder that younger men try to catch the trick of it. The +disappointing thing for them is that it is not a trick, but an +inherent virtue. His style is, upon the whole, better than that +of any other novelist I know; it is always easy, without being +trivial, and it is often stately, without being stiff; it gives a +charm to everything he writes; and he has written so much and in +such various directions, that we should be judging him very +incompletely if we considered him only as a novelist. His book +of European sketches must rank him with the most enlightened and +agreeable travelers; and it might be fitly supplemented from his +uncollected papers with a volume of American sketches. In his +essays on modern French writers he indicates his critical range +and grasp; but he scarcely does more, as his criticisms in "The +Atlantic" and "The Nation" and elsewhere could abundantly +testify. + +There are indeed those who insist that criticism is his true +vocation, and are impatient of his devotion to fiction; but I +suspect that these admirers are mistaken. A novelists he is not, +after the old fashion, or after any fashion but his own; yet +since he has finally made his public in his own way of +story-telling--or call it character-painting if you prefer,--it +must be conceded that he has chosen best for himself and his +readers in choosing the form of fiction for what he has to say. +It is, after all, what a writer has to say rather than what he +has to tell that we care for nowadays. In one manner or other +the stories were all told long ago; and now we want merely to +know what the novelist thinks about persons and situations. Mr. +James gratifies this philosophic desire. If he sometimes +forbears to tell us what he thinks of the last state of his +people, it is perhaps because that does not interest him, and a +large-minded criticism might well insist that it was childish to +demand that it must interest him. + +I am not sure that any criticism is sufficiently large-minded for +this. I own that I like a finished story; but then also I like +those which Mr. James seems not to finish. This is probably the +position of most of his readers, who cannot very logically +account for either preference. We can only make sure that we +have here an annalist, or analyst, as we choose, who fascinates +us from his first page to his last, whose narrative or whose +comment may enter into any minuteness of detail without fatiguing +us, and can only truly grieve us when it ceases. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Etext of Henry James, Jr., by Howells diff --git a/old/jimjr10.zip b/old/jimjr10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..126cfb1 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/jimjr10.zip |