Description
The Wings of the Dove is perhaps the most well-received of Henry James’s novels. First published in 1902, it follows Kate Croy and Merton Densher, an engaged couple in late-Victorian London, who meet Milly Theale, a wealthy American heiress.
Milly, though young and lively, is burdened with a fatal disease. She wishes to spend her last days on happy adventures through Europe, and her sparkling personality, still bright despite her looming death, quickly makes her a hit in the London social scene. As she plans an excursion to Venice, Kate and Merton, who are too poor to marry and still maintain their social standing, scheme to trick Milly out of her inheritance.
The character of Milly is partly based on Minny Temple, James’ cousin who died young of tuberculosis. He later wrote that the novel was his attempt to immortalize her memory, and that he spent years developing the core of the book’s conceit before committing it to the page. The novel is James at his peak: dizzyingly complex prose weaves rich, impressionistic character studies, heavy in symbolism and allusion, amid the glamorous backdrops of high-society London and decaying Venetian grandeur.
Description
A middle-aged man named Lambert Strether is sent to Paris by his wealthy wife-to-be in order to convince her son Chad to return home to America and take over the lucrative family business. This turns out to be much easier said than done, as Strether finds Chad much better adapted to European life than anyone expected.
James’ characteristically dense prose is matched by a cast of subtly-realized characters who rarely say exactly what they mean. Widely regarded as one of James’ best novels, The Ambassadors explores themes of love, duty, and aging, all told through the eyes of a man who wonders if life hasn’t passed him by.
This ebook follows the 1909 New York Edition, with one important exception: Since 1950, it has been generally agreed that the New York Edition had incorrectly ordered the first two chapters of Book XI. This text follows the convention of most printings since then, and the chapters have been returned to what is believed to have been James’ intended order.
Description
In The Golden Bowl, an impoverished Italian aristocrat comes to London to marry a wealthy American, but meets an old mistress before the wedding and spends time with her, helping her pick out a wedding gift. After their marriage, his wife maintains a close relationship with her father, while their own relationship becomes strained.
Completed in 1904, Henry James himself considered The Golden Bowl one of his best novels, and it remains one of critics’ favorites. Along with The Wings of the Dove and The Ambassadors, the novel represents James’ “major phase,” where he returned to the study of Americans abroad, which dominated his earlier career. The novel focuses almost entirely on four central characters, and explores themes of marriage and adultery in an intricate psychological study, which some critics have even suggested anticipates the style of stream-of-consciousness writing.
Description
One of the most famous ghost stories in literature, The Turn of the Screw earned its place in the annals of influential English novellas not for its qualities as a gothic ghost story, but rather for the many complex and subtle ways the reader can come to opposing conclusions as to tale’s very nature. Are the ghosts the governess sees real, or are they figments of her quiet insanity?
The Turn of the Screw was originally published as a serial, and later went through many revisions by James himself. Though there aren’t any overt suggestion that James intended his novella to be anything but a simple ghost story, the ambiguity in the narrative has captured the imagination of generations of readers and critics.