Henry James

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Henry James was an American playwright , critic and narrator , considered one of the great masters of modern fiction. A prolific author, he wrote around twenty novels, more than a hundred stories, several plays and countless reviews, as well as lucid essays that exerted an undoubted influence on many later authors.

Biographical summary

He was born on April 15 , 1843 to a wealthy family of Irish origin in New York City , United States . Son of Mary Walse James and the philosopher Henry James. Born into a wealthy family, he was the younger brother of the well-known philosopher and psychologist William James , who theorized about the “stream of consciousness”, a writing system that would be applied by such well-known authors as Virginia Woolf and James Joyce .

Childhood and youth

During his childhood, he lived in several places with his family, both in American cities and in some European ones, moving permanently to England in 1877 .

He studied in New York, London , Paris and Geneva . At the age of twenty he began publishing stories and articles in magazines in his country.

He began studying law at Harvard University , while also beginning to publish stories in various American magazines.

Literary beginnings

He began publishing short stories and articles at the age of twenty, and in Europe he became friends with writers such as Edmond de Goncourt , Guy de Maupassant and Honoré de Balzac . His perfectionist prose and meticulous study of each character were evident in his novels, works that are now highly acclaimed, such as Portrait of a Lady and The Turn of the Screw.

Her first novel Roderick Hudson ( 1876 ) brought her great fame and Daisy Miller ( 1878 ) was a popular success.

French Poets and Novelists ( 1878 ), Life of Hawthorne ( 1879 ), and Partial Portraits ( 1888 ) made him known as a critic. The best novel of this period, The Portrait of a Lady ( 1881 ), develops his own theme, the “international situation,” the American in Europe.

Some of his short stories are masterpieces. He wrote about writers and artists, as well as their problems, with profound insight and was a master of the symbolic ghost story. The most famous is The Turn of the Screw ( 1898 ), whose theme, the evil that takes possession of the souls of two children, has been given a Freudian interpretation.

Around 1890 he tried writing for the stage, and although he failed, he used the experience to give dramatic structure to his later novels: The Wings of the Dove ( 1902 ) and The Golden Bowl (1904 ) .

The way in which he narrates the mental processes of his characters makes him one of the indisputable precursors of the so-called “interior monologue”, in which he anticipated masters such as James Joyce or William Faulkner .

Death

He died on 28 February 1916 in London , at the age of 72.

Some of his works

His work is marked by the exquisite psychological description of his characters, the thoroughness of the objective portrait, the cultural contrasts between America and Europe , and the individual issue in his social environment.

  • The Story of a Masterpiece ( 1868 ).
  • Travelling Companions ( 1870 ).
  • Watch and Ward ( 1871 ).
  • Roderick Hudson ( 1875 ). Roderick Hudson.
  • The American ( 1877 ).
  • Daisy Miller ( 1878 ). Daisy Miller.
  • (1878). An international episode.
  • The Europeans (1878).
  • The Portrait of a Lady ( 1881 ).
  • Washington Square (1881). Washington Square.
  • The Point of View ( 1882 ).
  • Portraits of Places ( 1883 ). Partly in From Paris to the Pyrenees.
  • A Little Tour in France ( 1884 ).
  • The Bostonians ( 1886 ). The Bostonians.
  • The Princess Casamassima (1886). Princess Casamassima.
  • The Liar ( 1888 ).
  • The Aspern Papers (1888). The Aspern Papers ( The Poet’s Papers ).
  • The death of the lion
  • The Reverberator (1888)
  • A London Life ( 1889 ), three stories. A London Life and Other Stories, with The Choicest ( 1903 )
  • The Tragic Muse ( 1890 ).
  • The Coxon Fund ( 1893 ). The Coxon Fund
  • The figure on the carpet.
  • Guy Domville ( 1895 ).
  • The Spoils of Poynton ( 1897 ). The plunder of Poynton.
  • What Maisie Knew (1897). What Maisie knew.
  • The Turn of the Screw ( 1898 ) .
  • In the Cage (1898), In the cage.
  • The Awkward Age ( 1899 ). The ungrateful age.
  • The third Person ( 1900 ).
  • The Sacred Fountain ( 1901 ). The sacred fountain.
  • The Wings of the Dove ( 1902 ).
  • The Ambassadors ( 1903 ).
  • The Beast in the Jungle (1903).
  • The papers (1903).
  • A Small Boy ( 1911 ).
  • The Ivory Tower, posthumous and unfinished.
  • Lady Barberina.

 

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