Showing results by author "Henry James" in Genre Fiction

Romantic comedy, light and slightly awkward by Henry James with his characteristic observations of character, motivations and relationships. Two young men, best friends, deeply interested in the same woman. The background is Europe at the turn of the century and the world of ex-pats. With time and several countries, they each discover love.

En Los papeles de Aspern se debaten la pasión de un editor en busca de los "papeles" de su poeta favorito, la astucia de la mujer centenaria que fue amante del poeta y guarda celosamente esos papeles, y la estúpida ingenuidad de la sobrina, que se convierte en el eje de la lucha sorda y tensa entre el editor y la anciana. Toda la narración está envuelta en misterio, casi en suspense.

Este relato de Henry James es una fantástica puerta de entrada al autor victoriano. James teje la historia de un hombre enamorada de la esposa de su mejor amigo, y su resistencia hacia sus propios sentimientos.

Henry James's story Julia Bride appeared in Harper's magazine in 1908. Julia Bride is being courted by Basil French, the son of a wealthy but very traditional New York family. He wants to know more about her background, but she is reluctant to let him know that she has been engaged six times, and that her mother has been divorced twice and is likely heading for a third one. Julia is caught between America’s class mobility, social fluidity and personal freedoms, and the rigid ethics, snobbery, and social codes that the east coast elite had imported from Europe.

This ghost story is about a governess who, caring for two children at a remote estate, becomes convinced that the grounds are haunted.

"Daisy Miller", scritto nel 1878, è considerato uno dei capolavori dello scrittore americano Henry James. Ritratto intenso di una giovane americana che, nella buona società europea (la trama si dipana dalla Svizzera alla stupenda e decadente Roma dei papi), viene giudicata troppo libera (se ne va a passeggio per Roma dopo il tramonto, sola con un giovanotto che non è nemmeno il suo fidanzato...) e quindi imperdonabilmente poco seria, e messa al bando; solo dopo la sua morte improvvisa sapremo, insieme al protagonista narratore, che Daisy era assolutamente innocente, non una civetta o peggio, ma semplicemente una ragazza libera, indipendente, spontanea e disinteressata, amante del passeggiare e vagabondare, oppressa dai lacci delle convenzioni sociali che imprigionavano le donne.

La vuelta del tornillo del titulo es una variacion argumental que ingeniosamente plantea el autor. Desde que se publico hay una discusion entre sus lectores sobre si los fantasmas que ve la institutriz y que amenazan a los ninos que estan a cargo de ella son reales o fruto de su imaginacion.

Un uomo inglese di mezz'età torna a Firenze, dopo essersene allontanato 25 anni prima. Il ritorno nella città toscana lo porta a rivivere nel ricordo...

Civility and society come head to head in Henry James’ seminal work. The heroine of this powerful novel is the spirited young American Isabel Archer. Blessed by nature and fortune, she journeys to Europe to seek her future, but what she finds may prove to be her undoing. She is courted by three men: an English aristocrat, an American gentleman, and a sensitive expatriate. Her invalid cousin becomes her benefactor and adviser.

Published in 1886, The Bostonians begins with the arrival in Boston of Basil Ransom, a young Mississippi lawyer in search of a career. Through his cousin, Olive Chancellor, Ransom comes to meet Verena, the beautiful daughter of a charlatan faith-healer and showman. When they hear Verena talk, Olive hopes to win the girl over to the feminist cause, Ransom is attracted to her looks, and a battle for possession of the girl begins.

The Pupil is an excellent tale from James' middle period. Pemberton, a young American with an Oxford education and but little money, takes a job tutoring Morgan Moreen, the 12-year old son of an American couple living in Europe in a style above their income. The family of the pupil is both comic and unfortunate, and the child himself is vividly drawn. The pupil's parents waffle about paying Pemberton the salary to which they'd agreed in their view, he should be satisfied by his life with them, and by the joy of tutoring young Morgan?

Shunted between warring and neglectful divorced parents and caring governesses and step-parents, little Maisie lives in a bewildering world in this heart-rending novel.

The Portrait of a Lady tells the compelling and ultimately tragic tale of a beautiful young American woman's encounter with European sophistication. Set principally in England and Italy, we follow Isabel Archer's fortunes as a variety of admirers vie for her hand. Her choices will be crucial, and she is not wanting for advice, whether from the generous-spirited Ralph Touchett or the charming but rootless Madame Merle...

Henry James wrote many excellent ghost stories, his most famous being, The Turn of the Screw. In The Ghostly Rental a newcomer in town, who loves to walk for exercise, comes upon a deserted rural road. He follows the road and comes upon a house that immediately strikes him as "simply haunted." He is determined to get into the house and find out the truth about it. What he finds out turns out to be quite different than what he expected.

In this superb novella, a nameless narrator travels to Venice in search of Juliana Bordereau, the former lover of Jeffrey Aspern, a famous and now dead American poet. We witness the battle between a strong-willed woman who is determined to keep the secrets of a famous poet and an unscrupulous man who is equally determined to uncover them.

Contrasts in British and American manners and customs are cleverly drawn in this novella. We are thrown headfirst into the middle of an erupting marriage and an emerging love match. And we are introduced to the marvelous Lady Davenant.

This unfinished late novel is complex, convoluted, and poses a challenge for both amateur and professional Jamesians alike. In it, Henry James explores the reactions of a native young British heir to his inheritance of an American fortune during the Gilded Age as well as the reactions of members of his family and surrounding community.

On a quiet Christmas Eve, a governess’ manuscript detailing her encounters with the supernatural is read. She tells the story of moving into an estate to take care of two children and becoming slowly aware that the area is overrun with ghosts of the previous inhabitants - and that the children are aware that these ghosts exist.

A governess employed at a remote estate finds herself in charge of two young children. As the story unfolds, it would appear that nothing is as it should be. The governess doubts her own sanity when the children see things, and it seems that the estate is haunted. Is the governess in danger from the ghosts or is she in danger from the children?

Catherine Sloper, the heroine of this tragicomic tale set in mid-19th century New York, is absolutely ordinary in every way except for her exceptional capacities in love and loyalty. These latter qualities are of no interest to her father, the successful society Doctor who is constantly disappointed by his daughter's failure to be brilliant, either physically or intellectually. For this reason, he is highly suspicious when Morris Townsend begins to woo her and is convinced the handsome young man's interest is only in the fortune Catherine will eventually inherit.