HENRY JAMES UNLACED: HOW HIS FEMALE CHARACTERS REPRESENT AMERICA __________________ A University Thesis Presented to the Faculty of California State University, East Bay __________________ In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in English __________________ By Christine J. Ferguson March, 2007 Copyright © 2006 by Christine J. Ferguson ii Table of Contents Introduction 1 Chapter 1 3 Biography His family, style, and historical background Chapter 2 14 The American (1877) European historical weight versus American freedom Chapter 3 19 “Daisy Miller: A Study” (1878) An American girl, conquering a new frontier, Europe Chapter 4 27 The Portrait of a Lady (1881) An American woman chooses captivity Chapter 5 37 The Bostonians (1886) Feminism wields a masculine force Chapter 6 46 What Maisie Knew (1897) New frontiers: women opt for immoral behavior Chapter 7 52 “The Turn of the Screw” (1898) A domestic woman, enslaved by her mind Chapter 8 60 The American Scene (1905) A changed country; struggling feminine independence Conclusion 65 Works Cited 68 iv 1 Introduction The female characters in Henry James’ stories represent his conflict with America. Though born and raised in the United States, James struggled with the direction of his country’s choices. America renounced its allegiance with England to gain freedom and independence, discarding the restraining British traditions. Yet James remains critical of his country’s progress because he sees Americans beginning to seek out similar social constraints from which they fled. The seemingly un- American traits of prejudice and the stratification of class are adopted by the upper class traveling in Europe, weighing down society with its rigid structure. Our country became a contradiction: a wild young thing returning to its prior cage. In his political commentary, James cuts both ways: Criticizing Americans for their independent nature, while also commenting that Americans visiting or living oversees suffer from too many self-imposed social restrictions. James provides no answer to the problems, merely asks that we take notice. Subtly woven into the women of his creative genius, his characters emblematically display the struggles and triumphs of America. In “Daisy Miller: A Study” and The Portrait of a Lady, Daisy Miller and Isabel Archer are clearly shown as “types.” He even labels his writing “A Study” and “The Portrait.” In “Daisy Miller,” published in 1878, and later expanded upon for his 1881 book The Portrait of a Lady, the two main characters symbolize America’s attempts to make a place for itself in the world. Daisy is free-spirited and unbiased, but 2 Americans in Europe will not accept this newly-monied class and their dismissal of her in effect causes her death, a harsh conclusion. Though written a mere few years later, James gives Isabel Archer more choices of ways to spend her life. She also comes to a seemingly bitter end, returning to an unhappy marriage and her husband’s inevitable revenge. This shows that although more options present themselves, women, and therefore Americans, continue to subject themselves to unnecessarily painful endings. In this book we see other female characters representing various views, as opposed to the limited scope of women included in “Daisy Miller.” In her book Portraying the Lady, Donatella Izzo states, “the opinions on the aesthetic and personal relationship between Henry James and the woman question are curiously polarized. On one hand, the proliferation of scholarship on this topic attests to its centrality; on the other, the divergence of interpretations would seem to indicate its essential ambivalence and instability” (6). According to Harold Bloom in Bloom’s Reviews, in 1915, as his final political statement in protest of America’s neutrality at the beginning of World War I (13), James renounced his American citizenship and became an English subject. This showed that possibly the best course for America was to return to its roots to seek stability within those rigid bounds. 3 Chapter 1 – Biography His family, style, and historical background England experienced its Victorian Period from 1832-1901 with Queen Victoria’s accession to the throne in 1837, ruling until her death in 1901. Though a strong female leader, she opposed giving women the right to vote (“Kings and Queens of the UK”). Opinion on the issue of women’s advancement newly ignited and highly divided. If James supported the queen’s beliefs, it seems unfair to condemn him when such a strong female leader was a proponent of it. Innovations in science and technology contributed to the instability and uneasiness of society. During times of great change the population clings to stability particularly by reenacting past practices. Adding the redefinition of men’s and women’s roles produced too much to deal with during this period of upheaval. Literature reflected issues affecting the people in that day, such as problems surrounding the Industrial Revolution, growing class tensions, the early feminist movement, pressure toward political and social reform, and the impact of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution on philosophy and religion. On the streets during the late 1800’s, Jack the Ripper murders five prostitutes in crimes that remain unsolved, this period remains “a decade of financial panic marked by radical labor movements and violent strike-breaking,…massive immigration into Britain and America from Eastern Europe and crises on the Exchange and Wall Street” (Blair, 126). In a period defined by several wars, including the American Civil War which lasted from 1861 4 until 1865, many young men were defined by their military prowess. James, due to an ambiguous injury stayed home while his two younger brothers experienced the thrill of wartime combat responding to a strong anti-slavery sentiment and enlisting in the Northern Army. Fulfilling a “youthful desire for action, freedom, adventure…it was also a leap to manhood and the sudden achievement of a superior position in the family hierarchy” (Edel, Life, 61). Soon after, “[i]n intellectual Boston the war marked the era of ‘radicalism’ and a return to old conservative virtues” (Edel, Life, 67). Literature that could truly be defined as “American” sprung up in the Early National Period. Though the English style was continued, writers used authentically American settings, themes, and characters; poetry moved into realms independent of English predecessors. Then the end of the 19th century marked the beginning of literature’s Naturalistic Period, a style which provided an even more accurate description of life than Realism. Darwin’s theory of evolution impacted the writers to portray characters merely as higher-order animals whose behavior is entirely based upon heredity and environment. Writings tended towards topics of frankness, severity, and tragedy. Born on April 15, 1843 as the second son in a family of five children, and named after his father, Henry spent much of his early career being referred to as “Henry Jr.” His immediate family contains two other famous members: his father Henry Sr., and his brother William. Leon Edel provides a comprehensive life story of this man who outlived all of his siblings to the age of seventy two. Labeling James’s life 5 “passional” and “celibate,” Edel believed that James did not need to act out his libidinal desires, instead seeks “to sublimate them using the written word and sensual gratifications” (Edel, Life, xii). A quiet observer, from a prominent family, James’s grandfather, who would become known as William of Albany, emigrated from Ireland in 1789 after the Revolution. Merely eighteen years old, his drive enabled him to amass a fortune valued at three million dollars through various profitable business ventures. Testimony to his powerful status in the community lies in his connection with the building of the Erie Canal (Grattan, 15-16). A land-holder in upper New York state and Manhattan, his name held power and eventually streets in Albany and Syracuse were named “James,” as well as his city namesake: Jamesville, New York. Of the thirteen children born in the New World, eleven survived to enjoy the riches and status accumulated by their father. Henry Sr. seemed a different type from his father William of Albany; instead of falling into the business world, Henry Sr. focused on spiritual beliefs and the upbringing of his children. Losing a leg in a horse stable fire at age thirteen, he suffered a prolonged prostrate rehabilitation which stimulated his intellect. At age twenty one, William of Albany’s death exacerbated his emotional problems. With no financial shortcomings, in the next few years he chose to seek understanding for his misgivings over religion, therefore he enrolled in the Princeton Theological Seminary. Studying several years while his first two sons were born, Henry Sr. soon thereafter chose to take his young family abroad to England in search of answers he 6 was unable to find in America. His brother William, very embroiled in religious philosophy, believed “[t]he pivot round which the religious life, as we have traced it, revolves, is the interest of the individual in his private personal destiny” (William James, 381). Personal destiny was to be a theme much explored by James, in particular the destiny of women. Always interpreting the meaning in life and anticipating the path of history, Henry Sr. spent his lifetime as a philosopher and theologian, finding that many standard religions were too narrow for his “intensely social and loving spirit” he therefore “broadened his religious philosophy into a…universalism which embraced in its redemptive yearning, the entire race of mankind” (Young, 320). In 1844, at age thirty-three, suffering from a mental breakdown of sorts, Henry Sr. experienced a day-nightmare fearing the “invisible shape squatting in the room ‘raying out from his fetid personality influences fatal to life’” (Edel, Life, 7).