1st Edition

Writing the Self Henry James and America

By Peter Collister Copyright 2007

    A monograph that re-evaluates the final decade of Henry James' creative life. It examines the narrative of "The American Scene", the autobiographical writing, a number of short stories and two incomplete novels: works which offer contrasting notations of the self.

    Chapter 1 Letting Yourself Go : James Arrives in Twentieth-Century America; Chapter 2 Surrendering to the Messages of New York; Chapter 3 Boston and Cambridge: Initiations from the Past; Chapter 4 Asking 'as Few Questions as Possible' in Arcadian New England; Chapter 5 Hearing the Voices of the South; Chapter 6 'Unwritten History': The Romance of James's Civil War Stories; Chapter 7 'Doing Something' for the Soldiers of the Civil War; Chapter 8 Life-Writing for the Man of Letters; Chapter 9 'An Influence Beyond My Notation': The Self-Reflexive Figures of 'the Jolly Corner'; Chapter 10 Opening Doors Into the Sense of the Past; Chapter 11 'A Round of Visits': Effects Achieved 'Without the Aid of the Ladies'; Chapter 12 Waking up to 'Some Pretty Big Things' in the Ivory Tower;

    Biography

    Peter Collister