The Portrait of a Lady (Penguin Classics)
by Henry James
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Book Summary Information
Author: Henry JamesEditor: Geoffrey Moore
Editor: Patricia Crick
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2003-09
ISBN: 0141439637
Number of pages: 656
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Book Reviews of The Portrait of a Lady (Penguin Classics)
Book Review: The Sublime and the Swine
Summary: 5 Stars
Perhaps an alternate title for The Portrait of a Lady might be The Velvet Pit and the Silk Pendulum. It is a kind of blend of the sensibilities of Oscar Wilde at his "aesthetically" sunniest, and of Poe in the grimmest of his catacombs.
Probably the most striking feature of the book is what is usually called "style." In my view this is a misleading and inadequate term because it implies that style is something essentially separate from content, rather like suits of clothes that can be changed as fashion changes, with the inner content and substance remaining unaffected. But in a novel, there literally is no content without its creation through language, and the particular, artful, "signature" quality of that language, in all its specificity-paragraphs, sentences, phrases, individual words-literally forms, gives existence to, content.
And this signature style is at bottom nothing more than what could be called the state of consciousness of the author, of the storytelling subject generating the linguistic "world of objects"of the book. The exact language employed, and the images it forms, weaves a kind of virtual tapestry of the mind of the author. We are made, through reading, to "see" the world and events of the story ("objects") but what we consequently see is not the world of the novel, but that world only as filtered through, and created by, the consciousness of the author.
This is what is so distinctive in The Portrait of a Lady. Much of the novel takes place in Italy, with all of the "fine" artifacts and objects d'art on display there. But the mind of Henry James is itself a kind of Titian; consider, for example, the following passages:
A genteel young man trying to look fierce, but "who smelled more of heliotrope than of gunpowder." A young lady determined to improve her mind who sits with a book, "trudging across the sandy plain of German Thought."
The same young lady, introspectively contemplating her own habit of happy introspection, but who is not, perhaps, quite as wisely Socratic as she imagines: "Her nature had, in her conceit, a certain garden-like quality, a suggestion of perfume and murmuring boughs, of shady bowers and lengthening vistas, which made her feel that introspection was, after all, an exercise in the open air, and that a visit to the recesses of one's spirit was harmless when one returned from it with a lapful of roses."
And a Countess, mature in years if not in outlook, of dubious morality: "[This] lady had so mismanaged her improprieties that they had ceased to hang together at all-which was at the least what one asked of such matters-and had become the mere floating fragments of a wrecked renown, incommoding social circulation....[She was married] to an Italian nobleman who had perhaps given her some excuse for attempting to quench the consciousness of outrage. The Countess, however, had consoled herself outrageously, and the list of her excuses had now lost itself in the labyrinth of her adventures."
These sallies are not isolated flashes in the dark; the entire novel is made of various textures of language-of symbolic consciousness-resembling the above.
James has to some degree a reputation as a mere glider through drawing rooms, a cerebral houseguest of life who closely observes but never really lives. He "thinks" life; he does not really experience it. This idea is simply ludicrous. I know little of the circumstances of his life, but unless he be a God, it is simply impossible for the author of The Portrait of a Lady not to have lived, and lived deeply, and from that indispensable perspective comprehended all of the deep structures of human nature that are so truthfully on display here.
There is a scene in the novel in which character "A" makes a titanic appeal, a beautiful appeal, to character "B.." We had not before seen such as this from "A." His/Her entreaty arises from a place, a depth, in which "Nature" and human nature, merge and become one. It is a place of unique power. The rest of the novel follows inevitably from this scene (I am being deliberately obscure so as not to spoil the story). Only a real human being living a real human life could have written such a scene, with all it contains and implies. If this is not enough, Chapter 42 alone should serve. If this won't do, the totality of The Portrait of a Lady is an annihilating piece of evidence. Read the book!
And it is not just "deep stuff" that recommends the novel, but all manner of drama! You will encounter a lounge lizard who hangs out in his Louvre, a pimp who plays Schubert, a wind-up toy standing in for a daughter, and a spirited young lady who takes a trip to the taxidermist. Upon discovering that it is she who is the object of that worthy's attentions (a gentleman of exquisite sensibilities), she naturally resists. Thus, in due course, she is deposited in the velvet pit. And the pendulum begins to swing.
Will she escape? The book ends in a manner that in many ways is reminiscent of Ibsen's Ghosts, and for similar reasons (form & theme, not content). Only Mrs. Alving is doomed, but Isabel? Well....
Summary of The Portrait of a Lady (Penguin Classics)
When Isabel Archer, a beautiful, spirited American, is brought to Europe by her wealthy Aunt Touchett, it is expected that she will soon marry. But Isabel, resolved to determine her own fate, does not hesitate to turn down two eligible suitors. She then finds herself irresistibly drawn to Gilbert Osmond, who, beneath his veneer of charm and cultivation, is cruelty itself. A story of intense poignancy, Isabel's tale of love and betrayal still resonates with modern audiences.
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