The Europeans is the most entertaining James novel I've read so far in
my quest of reading all his novels in chronological order. It's a
sort-of reversal of The American; instead of a financially successful
American attempting to marry into European aristocracy, The Europeans
concerns mid-19th century visitors from across the pond staying with and
somewhat preying upon, plain-living New Englanders of various types,
with marriage as the ultimate goal.
The Europeans are a broke and
devil-may-care bohemian/artist and his older sister, unequally married
to a prince attempting to dump her. The machinations of this somewhat
dubious couple's attempts to ingratiate themselves into the lives (if
not the hearts) of their straight-faced cousins are fascinating, subtle
and frequently funny. The short novel is not considered one of James'
best works, but it has a sort of tossed off quality that rings truer
than some of his more labored over "serious" work. All of the characters
ring true to my mind and the work is a slow simmering mixture of
comedy, pathos and acute observation of manners.
I read this book 34 years ago, and enjoyed even more reading it recently.
One
thought that occurred to me while reading The Europeans is how unworthy
the medium of film is in translating good literature to sound and
pictures. Film is literally incapable of communicating the depth of
details presented in text. Consider, for example, how this passage would
be filmed. I'll find out soon, when I watch the Merchant-Ivory
adaptation onto film:
The Baroness took her uncle's hand, and
stood looking at him with her ugly face and her beautiful smile. "Have I
done right to come?" she asked.
"Very right, very right," said
Mr. Wentworth, solemnly. He had arranged in his mind a little speech;
but now it quite faded away. He felt almost frightened. He had never
been looked at in just that way—with just that fixed, intense smile—by
any woman; and it perplexed and weighed upon him, now, that the
woman who was smiling so and who had instantly given him a vivid sense
of her possessing other unprecedented attributes, was his own niece, the
child of his own father's daughter. The idea that his niece should be a
German Baroness, married "morganatically" to a Prince, had already
given him much to think about. Was it right, was it just, was it
acceptable? He always slept badly, and the night before he had lain
awake much more even than usual, asking himself these questions. The
strange word "morganatic" was constantly in his ears; it reminded him of
a certain Mrs. Morgan whom he had once known and who had been a bold,
unpleasant woman. He had a feeling that it was his duty, so long as the
Baroness looked at him, smiling in that way, to meet her glance with his
own scrupulously adjusted, consciously frigid organs of vision; but on
this occasion he failed to perform his duty to the last. He looked away
toward his daughters. "We are very glad to see you," he had said. "Allow
me to introduce my daughters - Miss Charlotte Wentworth, Miss Gertrude Wentworth."
Recently read: The American, Henry James' 1877 novel of American capitalistic brashness clashing with unyielding Parisian aristocracy.
The novel, James' third (if you count his immature Watch and Ward - he didn't count it) is a transitional novel, more complex and arresting than his previous Roderick Hudson. In The American, James' protagonist is Christopher Newman, a self-made, uncultured American millionaire who travels to Paris to find (i.e. buy, with his freedom and wealth) culture and a wife. He aims for what he perceives as the top: a beautiful widow, Claire de Cintré, of the long-lived and righteously proud Bellegarde family.
Despite a second half which some readers (though not me) find too melodramatic (I thought the novel surprisingly detoured into Dickens-like material), The American is a compelling read to the last ironically sad page. The subtle and often witty verbal sparring is measured and engaging.
James' descriptions, based on his own limited admittance into Parisian high culture, brings the Bellegardes and their hermetic residence to life; I feel as if I've visited there. Certainly souls quite like the Bellegardes must have made an acute impression on James because, with the exception of Claire, they are the most sharply drawn characters in the book.
Truth be told, I found my sympathies for the characters divided: I could relate to both Newman's and the Bellegarde's uncompromising determinations and positions. James' main intention for the novel was to write about an American wronged by the old aristocracy and ultimately doing the "right thing" in return. This makes for a plot that perhaps sounds more potentially satisfying than the final result.
The novel does suffer somewhat from the sketchiness with which James draws Claire. Little is revealed by her or about her apart from Newman's somewhat superficial observations and interractions, making the love he professes to feel for her less convincing than it might have been, if not almost puzzling. This fault in the novel coincides with Newman's lack of passion and energy in fighting for the hand of Claire when that's what's required for him to meet the goal the novel has established for him. Certainly a man who started with little in life and made an immense fortune manufacturing washtubs wouldn't admit defeat as wimpily as Newman does. It's almost as if James couldn't conceive of, or bring himself to write about, the sort of person who would passionately love and passionately fight for love. James, who never married, frequently disallows his protagonists to marry and the critical reviews of the novel when it was first published are so united in their puzzlement over this aspect of the plot that they almost, understandably and inadvertently, become an indictment against James the person (as opposed to James, the novelist).
The version of The American I read was a Norton Critical Edition, with plentiful footnotes, James' frequently inscrutable forward to the 1907 "New York" edition, excerpts from James' letters at the time of the writing of the novel, reviews written when the novel was first published
and various 20th century reviews. The Norton Edition also contains the "happy ending" version of a play James wrote based on the novel, a cringe-inducing example of an artist throwing what he has to know is slop to a perceived audience of pigs.
In the name of all that's good, if you decide to read the novel, please read the original 1877 version instead of James' 1907 revision. The rewritten version thickly covers the fresh immediacy and clarity of the original text with elaborately needless details and twisting asides which frequently obscure rather than reveal James' original intent.
Having read James' first two novels, Watch and Ward and Roderick Hudson, I'll be tackling (in truth, the roughhousing will be minimal) James' third novel, The American, as soon as I'm caught up with several of Marvel's Avengers series and The New Yorker.
The novel was originally serialized in The Atlantic Monthly from 1876-1877.
