James, Henry,--1843-1916--Criticism and interpretation

The word "anomaly" in The Portrait of a Lady forms a nexus of meanings derived from its denotative and connotative meanings. This complex of meaning bring in focus phenomenological aspects of character, action, and style translating into larger thematic concepts to create a level of understanding deepening the experience of the novel. Isabel Archer is examined for her anomalous portrayal of a modern character whose complexity emerges as a dynamic of the anomalous and the vulgar that are distinguishable but ultimately inseparable. Using a phenomenological approach, the word "anomaly," as recurring descriptive term, can be studied in its juxtaposition to other words, such as vulgarity, providing additional insight into characterization and action in Portrait of a Lady.

Henry James's and Plato's presumed ideological incompatibility is fostered in part by the philosopher's well documented censure of literature and the arts and by his belief that true knowledge is secured by purely rational apprehension. Henry James, however, contends that the philosopher and novelist have comparable concerns, for both seek truth and the origins and meaning of virtue. Plato's conception of knowledge and ethics, however, differs markedly from James's: if true knowledge is commensurate with rational apprehension, emotions and imagination distort rather than elucidate truth. Yet is there but a single path to knowledge? In What Maisie Knew James illustrates that learning, like narrative, is an experiential process involving intuition, emotion, and imagination. Moreover, although Jamesian and Platonic thought may appear antithetical, a comprehensive study of their works reveals not only the expected differences, but certain unexpected discursive and ideological similarities.

Henry James's In the Cage offers a character, a young female telegraphist, who constantly applies theories to and comes up with interpretations of the people, objects, and events that make up the world outside her cage. The experiences she undergoes with the telegrams' ambiguous messages and her customers' strange actions compel her to weave an intricate drama that not only clears up the ambiguities but also allows her to play an important role. She creates a subjective reality through which she can embark on an exciting, dangerous adventure. This reality, however, is not immutable. When faced with new sets of circumstances, new flashes from the outside world, she struggles to re-work her interpretations and re-create her fiction; like Odysseus, she is forced to submit to an overwhelming external power and find a new path on which to travel.

In revising his works for inclusion in the New York Edition, James shows his artistic growth. The revised text of An International Episode, James's tale of the English in America and the Americans in England, startles the reader who compares it with the earlier Cornhill publication. The characters, as well as the worlds that they inhabit and visit, are changed by James's additions of new dialogue and description. An International Episode was initially reviewed as unfairly satirical in its portrayal of English customs and English characters. My thesis argues that many changes to the original text were James's response to this criticism. His text for the New York Edition shows a balancing of English and American characterizations, revealing a more equal satire.

Henry James's concern with "age," both as concept and in regard
to character, involves variable temporal factors such as simple
chronological age as opposed to, for instance, psychological age.
The particular manifestations of age can be categorized ucder the
headings of ambiguity, transformation and paradox. These techniques
arise throughout James's fiction as a result of underlying polarity.
Polarity, which is characterized by interpenetrated possibilities,
can be linked to William James's pragmatism, thereby elucidating
Henry's tendency toward pragmatistic thought. Works chosen to
represent ambiguities of age are The Awkward Age, "The Middle Years,"
and "The Jolly Corner"; transformation, "The Last of the Valerii,"
"The Aspern Papers," The Golden Bowl , and The Ambassadors; paradox,
"Daisy Miller, "The Pupil," The Ambassadors, and The Golden Bowl.

Language of spatial movement, the arbitrary placement of
values on a vertical scale, operates in the fiction of
James as a means of expressing central themes, as well as
minor themes that "depend" from them. The placement of
something on a scale, either high or low, indicates the
difficulty of permanence or of "fixing" in a world where
change is a necessary condition of life. In "The Lesson
of the Master" the idea of perfection as the apex of the
vertical scale develops conflicts and ironies. The artistnarrator
in "The Real Thing" thinks in terms of the
paradoxical perpendicular scale in practicing his art
of illustration. In "The Birthplace" Morris Gedge manifests
a more complex, ironical version of this idea in his obtuse
and non-fixed values.