Delice
Francis Muir
Mariage* should make it quite clear who'll like this novel and who will not.
"In her own view, she may have felt she had mysteriously earned her
looks, wealth, and good fortune by the conscious exercize of virtue."
"The psychological _soulagements_ of crime--what was the English word
for _soulagement_? He often lost words,which hurtled unrecoverably into
some slot between his English and his French, a great disadvantage for
someone who made his living writing."
"Deploring French traffic was not just rhetorical; their most important
people were run over in traffic--Roland Barthes, and the head of
Cartier, who stepped out of his shop on the Place Vendome. death in
traffic a tradition going back at least as far as the husband of Madame
Curie, mown down by a horsecab, his mind on his wife's infidelities."
I am finding it a most delicious romp and I already read four chapters
this morning in bed. My unusual advice to those not familiar with La
Belle Diane is first to read her ObFemBio: *Lesser LIves* which I
believe she wrote during her year in Cambridge on a Fulbright.
krazy kat
says...
Sounds wonderful. (You start to read even *before* you get up?)
I've been wondering whether to try this author ever since I read the
review of this novel on the NYT site, and saw it described (I think) as
Jamesian. Any mention of the word Jamesian is usually enough to get me
interested.
Thanks for the quotations -- they certainly clench the deal for me.
--
Frank Lekens
operamail.com is where it's really @
Francis Muir
>
> In article <39858519...@stanford.edu>, fra...@stanford.edu
> says...
> > One or two snippets from the beginning chapters of Diane Johnson's *Le
> > Mariage* should make it quite clear who'll like this novel and who will not.
> >
> > "In her own view, she may have felt she had mysteriously earned her
> > looks, wealth, and good fortune by the conscious exercize of virtue."
> >
> > "The psychological _soulagements_ of crime--what was the English word
> > for _soulagement_? He often lost words,which hurtled unrecoverably into
> > some slot between his English and his French, a great disadvantage for
> > someone who made his living writing."
> >
> > "Deploring French traffic was not just rhetorical; their most important
> > people were run over in traffic--Roland Barthes, and the head of
> > Cartier, who stepped out of his shop on the Place Vendome. death in
> > traffic a tradition going back at least as far as the husband of Madame
> > Curie, mown down by a horsecab, his mind on his wife's infidelities."
> >
> > I am finding it a most delicious romp and I already read four chapters
> > this morning in bed. My unusual advice to those not familiar with La
> > Belle Diane is first to read her ObFemBio: *Lesser LIves* which I
> > believe she wrote during her year in Cambridge on a Fulbright.
> >
>
> Sounds wonderful. (You start to read even *before* you get up?)
Of course; doesn't everyone? I wake up at 4:45 to the muted sounds of
our local classical radio station and normally allow myself 15 minutes
before jumping up and putting on the coffee (Celebes Kalossi).
> I've been wondering whether to try this author ever since I read the
> review of this novel on the NYT site, and saw it described (I think) as
> Jamesian. Any mention of the word Jamesian is usually enough to get me
> interested.
>
> Thanks for the quotations -- they certainly clench the deal for me.
I have never read James, or if I have I have forgotten, but Johnson
seems to have picked up extended irony from somewhare. Swift? Austen?
krazy kat
says...
> > Sounds wonderful. (You start to read even *before* you get up?)
>
> Of course; doesn't everyone? I wake up at 4:45 to the muted sounds of
> our local classical radio station and normally allow myself 15 minutes
> before jumping up and putting on the coffee (Celebes Kalossi).
>
Ah well. I don't think I could open my eyes wide enough to read one
sentence before I've had a shower and (especially) some espresso.
>
> I have never read James, or if I have I have forgotten, but Johnson
> seems to have picked up extended irony from somewhare. Swift? Austen?
>
Must be. It's probably not so much the irony they labelled Jamesian, as
the "American in Europa" aspect. I've just bought her previous novel Le
Divorce, and it is prefaced by a quotation on that theme from Henry
James.
I'm getting very eager to read Johnson. Meanwhile, I'm still reading
Lorrie Moore's story collection Birds of America - and I suspect that
you'd like her as well. The single most striking thing to me, in both
this and her short novel Who's Running the Frog Hospital, is how
incredibly *witty* she is.
Now, just in case you or anyone else want to try out James, I'll take
this occasion to try and formulate what would be my recommendations to
readers new to James.
I think all of his work deserves to be read. (I don't know if James is
the author I'd turn to at 5 o'clock in the morning [when I'm usually
fast asleep]; but I am very certain that I would like to read every
single piece of fiction he ever wrote.) But I agree that it is an
acquired taste - and choosing the wrong novel to start with may turn one
off James for life.
It's become a fairly lengthy piece; just skip it if you don't have much
use for James (or for my ramblings). But you mention Swift, and now
*there's* a writer I haven't read much of. I haven't gone beyond the
Modest Proposal and Gulliver's Travels. As 99% of my reading consists of
novels and short stories, I hardly ever venture back to anything before
Austen. Which of Swift's writings would you recommend if I wanted to
read some more of him?
Now on to Henry James:
My overall advice would be to start with some early James - or James I.
Early James has a freshness and spontaneity that is sometimes a little
lacking in the stultified prose of "The Old Pretender".
Secondly, I wouldn't necessarily advise anyone to start with the
obvious titles: Portrait of a Lady, or the standard classroom text Daisy
Miller. I'm not overly fond of Daisy Miller - I think lacks the *humour*
that can be found in spades in some other works of James I.
And Portrait is wonderful, but longish; and probably as popular
as it is only because it comes closest to being an English equivalent to
the Bovary/Karenina-paradigm that has come to represent in people's
minds the quintessential nineteenth century novel. "Portrait" also
contains relatively little comedy, if I remember correctly. And it's
James' comedy which I myself like most; so that's what I'm going to
recommend here.
My first recommendations would be a couple of books which The Old
Pretender seemed to think little of, as he didn't include them in his
New York Edition. For the early works generally, my advice would be to
try and get an edition that contains the text of the first publication
rather than James' reworking of them for the New York Edition. Such an
edition is not always available, and the advantage of the titles I will
recommend is that there *is* no New York text of them.
These recommended books are The Europeans and Washington Square.
To this I'll add the delightful early novella/short story An
International Episode, which James did include in his New York Edition.
The Europeans and An International Episode deal with those arch-
Jamesian themes of the contrast between Englishmen and Americans, Old
World/New World &c. But rather than tragedies on a large canvas, they're
delightful, refined comedies on a small scale.
Washington Square is one of James' few works that take place
entirely in America. It's a Balzacian comedy about a rich but
unattractive heiress being courted by a fortune hunter. It's short,
funny and ruthless. And it's of great interest also as a prefiguration
of James' last novel The Golden Bowl - where he reuses the initial
premise, but gives it a different twist, adds his well-known Old
World/New World theme *and* his famous late style periphrasis. (No
mistake about it: The Golden Bowl is the greater work. But emphatically
*not* the best place to start exploring James, IMHO.)
There are some other novels and novellas that I would recommend to
people new to James - mainly because they're short, often rather
humorous, and relatively accessible. This would include for instance The
Spoils of Poynton (middle James or "James II" - but with the same
Balzacian flavour of Washington Square, I think) and What Maisy Knew and
most of all The Aspern Papers.
Together with the comedy of American-European relations, the
atmosphere of The Aspern Papers is the first thing that comes to my mind
when people use the adjective "Jamesian". It's a delightful romp on the
theme of a visit to a deceased writer's lover to try and retrieve some
of his writings.
James wrote a fair deal of stories about artist's in general and
writers in particular. I have a special fondness for fiction about that
subject, and James is one of its foremost practitioners. Indeed, I tend
to think of the entire tradition of novels about novelists, and
especially about young novelists' admiration for older novelists (Cakes
and Ale, The Messiah of Stockholm, The Ghost Writer, to name just a few)
as Jamesian.
Penguin has published a collection of James' stories on this
theme, "The Figure in the Carpet and other stories", selected and
superbly edited by Frank Kermode. I think this is another very
accessible collection of stories.
Some novels that would not be a good introduction to James:
Roderick Hudson, The American (where James' art hasn't fully matured
yet), The Princess Casamassima, The Bostonians, The Tragical Muse, The
Awkward Age, The Sacred Fount. And of course his glorious three last
novels, The Ambassadors, The Wings of the Dove and The Golden Bowl -
superb works, but steeped so deeply in his difficult late style that
they make for heavy going.
And finally, anyone who wants to read James without having to face all
the fuss, just read Edith Wharton. Cheers.
Jean Clarke
headlines until 9:00, drift back to sleep until noon and then some Cafe'
du Monde! I save my reading until late in the evening or just run out
of eyeballs reading the threads. Just a Jeanie