Wings of the Dove, The: Background & Resources

[Lily]

MadgeUK wrote: "I like the Paradise Lost references to Kate as Satan..."

Don't forget that some critics and some just plain ordinary readers feel Milton made Satan perhaps an even more enticing character than God. LOL!

[MadgeUK]

True Lily, including me:) However, I don't think James made Kate enticing - he seems take the traditional view. Also, if we think about WotD as Milly representing his dying cousin, he would be unlikely to place Kate in a benign light?

[[deleted user]]

MadgeUK wrote: "True Lily, including me:) However, I don't think James made Kate enticing - he seems take the traditional view. Also, if we think about WotD as Milly representing his dying cousin, he would be unl..."

Madge, you make such a solid, solid point there about Milly, ie, that James would have (and did) write her as the sympathetic character. But i LIKE Kate...and I'm fairly certain I try to rationalize for actions as I read along.

I plan to re-read the last book of the Iliad tonight, and i'm packing WoD, too, to catch up on the reading. Hope, therefore, to post Tuesday.

[MadgeUK]

You like the bad gels eh, Adelle?:D

[[deleted user]]

MadgeUK wrote: "You like the bad gels eh, Adelle?:D"

Lol. I plead the fifth.

http://www.google.com/search?q=i+plea...

But I plan to argue that Kate is not a bad girl.
That even though James thought that he was writing Millie to be the high point, that unconsciously he was writing KATE to be the highest, best character.

[Lily]

Adelle wrote: "...That even though James thought that he was writing Millie to be the high point, that unconsciously he was writing KATE to be the highest, best character."

Should be an interesting discussion. Don't know about "highest, best," given his supposed relationship to the model for Milly. But certainly we have several morally ambiguous decisions floating around here for meaty discussion?

[MadgeUK]

There is a bizarre story about James at the beginning of this very interesting essay about him, which includes some insights into WotD and his relationship with Minny Temple, his cousin:-

http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/g/...

Another review of the same book, with more revealing insights. ((Possible Spoiler.):-

http://www.nytimes.com/books/99/05/16...

[[deleted user]]

Nytimes link asks for a log in. Cannot read the " very interesting essay about him."

[MadgeUK]

Oh - I read it OK without logging in.

[[deleted user]]

:)...Must like you better.

[MadgeUK]

The bizarre story is that Henry James had a close homo-erotic relationship with the writer Constance Fenimore Woolson, who suffered from depression and is thought to have committed suicide by falling from the balcony of her flat in Venice. After her death he took out a gondola and was seen 'drowning' her clothes in the Lagoon.

[Linda2]

Adelle wrote: ":)...Must like you better."

Try my login, will PM you.

[Linda2]

MadgeUK wrote: "The bizarre story is that Henry James had a close homo-erotic relationship with the writer Constance Fenimore Woolson, who suffered from depression and is thought to have committed suicide by falli..."

A homo-erotic relationship with a woman? Huh?

[MadgeUK]

Well sort of because she was a closet lesbian and he was a closet homosexual. She is said to have 'fancied' him but he didn't return her affection - very complicated but there was homo-erotic correspondece.

[Lily]

There is a fascinating exploration of the morality issues of WotD in this article by Sigi Jöttkandt, SUNY Buffalo, for an International Henry James Conference in 2002:

"Metaphor, Hysteria, and the Ethics of Desire in Wings of the Dove"

http://mockingbird.creighton.edu/engl...

I don't pretend to totally understand it; Lacan still remains impenetrable for me. But the gist of the idea that life itself is unfulfilled desire that only is fulfilled with death is tantalizing (if I interpret at least one possibility of these words faithfully to their intent) -- especially this week as I watch a beloved relative's journey through palliative care. It is also a view of life and death that I find painful. Still, it lends credence to Sir Luke's stance towards Milly, which is somewhat intriguing, too, considering the sibling rivalry and familial communications between Henry and his brother William.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_...

The word "hysteria" confuses me. My own sense is that it was one that was popularized by Freud (or already in wide-spread use), especially as applicable to women, during that period of history and has subsequently been debunked and/or replaced by more discerning terminology, but that view is subject to clarification, even correction, let alone replacement!

Here is a dictionary definition (note the etymology):

Etymology: New Latin, from English hysteric + New Latin -ia; Latin hystericus of the womb
1 a : a psychoneurosis that is marked by emotional excitability involving disturbances of the psychic, sensory, vasomotor, and visceral functions b : a similar disease of domesticated animals; specifically : CANINE HYSTERIA
2 : conduct or an outbreak of conduct exhibiting unmanageable fear or emotional excess in individuals or groups
synonym see MANIA


"hysteria." Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002. http://unabridged.merriam-webster.com (9 Apr. 2012).

Incidentally, this is the dictionary source that I rely upon. If the OED were available online at a comparable price, I might choose otherwise. But, I treat this as simply another necessary "utility" or subscription. It does indeed differ from m-w.com, which has become so heavily infused with advertising, but used to be my first path before coming here for more obscure words. Now, I simply keep this on a tab, often an open one.

[Lily]

I realize now @101 is essentially a repeat of @96. But, I now have spent more time with the essay and do very much recommend it. Still, like Adelle, you may prefer to wait until you have expressed your own views directly from the text and from the information you already carry into your reading of it. (Saw a stage production of "12 Angry Men" last night, the play about a jury deliberation. The comment of the person who convinced me to attend was about the extent to which each juror carried his own unique background into his reasoning, his emotions, and his decision making -- this was an all-male jury. Still, the value of diversity was evident.)

[Lily]

I am still too tired to post cogently, but will mention here that a copy of the 1976 (or was it 1978) Norton Edition of WotD was waiting for me on my return. I read a fair piece of the criticism section last night and found the articles very insightful. There was a considerable amount on structure and that compared various characters of James's.

[[deleted user]]

I am THIS close to finishing. So this weekend I'll be reading that essay.

[Lily]

Adelle wrote: "I am THIS close to finishing. So this weekend I'll be reading that essay."

Thank you for all the notes you have been providing.

I spent more time with Norton this morning. It is a) giving me additional eyes into WotD, b) whetting my interest in reading other books by James, and c) making me wonder what criticism of WotD beyond the 1960's has been like, especially post-911 and post-Iraq war. It raised questions of what authors of the 20th and 21st centuries to compare with James. (Is Graham Greene one of them? I have read very little of his work.) I found myself asking: 1) what novels compare a less naive America with Europe, 2) what are the comparable post-World War novels?

[Lily]

The following is from a review of Millicent Bell's Meaning in Henry James (bold added):

"January 1, 1993

"Henry James rebelled intuitively against the tyranny and banality of plots. Believing a life to have many potential paths and a self to hold many destinies, he hung the evocative shadow of "what might have been" over much of what he wrote. Yet James also realized that no life can be lived--and no story written--except by submission to some outcome. The limiting conventions of society and literature are, he found, almost inescapable. In a major, comprehensive new study of James's work, Millicent Bell explores this oscillation between hope and fatalism, indeterminacy and form, and uncertainty and meaning. In the process Bell provides fresh insight into how we read and interpret fiction.

Continued within (view spoiler)[
"Bell demonstrates how James's texts steadfastly, almost perversely at times, preserve a sense of alternative possibilities. James involves his characters in overlapping scenarios drawn from folklore, drama, literature, or naturalist formula. The reader engages, with the hero or heroine, in imagining many plots other than the one that finally-and often ambiguously--emerges. The story arouses expectations, proposes courses, then cancels them successively. In complicity with author and character, the reader crafts the story in an adventure of constant revision and anticipation. Literary meaning becomes an experience as well as a goal. In the end, revelations and resolutions, even if unclear or partial, assume an altered significance in light of the earlier imaginings.

"Not surprisingly, James's deepest sympathies lay with those characters who resisted entrapment by cultural expectations--his idealistic free spirits like Isabel, his marriage renouncers like Fleda Vetch, his largely silent and detached witnesses to life like Strether and the generous Maisie. They are frequently the victims of callous manipulators who box them into oppressive roles or who literally 'plot against' them. By looking closely at James's critiques of clever" [sic] categorical mind and at his loving and complex portraits of characters of unfulfilled potentiality, Bell celebrates the paradoxes of James's story-denying fiction.

"In extended analyses of 'Daisy Miller,' Washington Square, The Portrait of a Lady; The Bostonians, The Princess Casamassima, 'The Aspern Papers,' The Spoils of Poynton, 'The Turn of the Screw,' What Maisie Knew, 'The Beast in the Jungle,' 'The Jolly Corner,' The Wings of the Dove, and The Ambassadors, Bell relates James's work to influential movements of the day, notably impressionism and naturalism. She examines the influence of Hawthorne, Emerson, Flaubert, Balzac, and Zola on James at various periods throughout his career. Drawing on rich traditions of criticism and on stimulating recent theories, Bell forges a critical approach both accessible and profound for this elegant reading of one of the greatest writers of this or any time.

"It is a book that will be of high value and interest to the advanced scholar--marking out new ground in its methodology and offering innovative interpretations of James's fiction. At the same time, it will appeal equally to the general, reader, who will find his reading of James enriched by Bell's lucid and impassioned discussion." (hide spoiler)]

[Laurel]

Lily wrote: "The following is from a review of Millicent Bell's Meaning in Henry James (bold added):

"January 1, 1993

"Henry James rebelled intuitively against the tyranny and banality of plots. Believing a l..."

This makes a lot of sense, Lily. Thanks!

[[deleted user]]

Lily wrote: "I spent more time with Norton this morning. It is..."

Lily, thank you for this reminder. The library wanted their copy back some weeks ago, but I'm about ready to read essays and post reminded me that there were essays at the back of the Norton edition.

[[deleted user]]

Lily wrote: " I found myself asking: 1) what novels compare a less naive America with Europe, 2) what are the comparable post-World War novels? .."

Are you thinking post-WWI or post-WWII? Although, I sat here awhile this morning and couldn't think of any for either case. But surely, surely, there must be some. Specifically, I can't think of any highlighting American women... Hemingway has Jake in The Sun Also Rises (right?) Fitzgerald has Americans in Europe in Tender Is the Night.

Oddly...I can't think of any Americans in England post-war novels.

[Bill]

Adelle wrote, "Oddly...I can't think of any Americans in England post-war novels."

We went to Paris, and who can blame us? Everyone else did. Charles Ryder in "Brideshead Revisited," Stephen Daedalus between "Portrait of the Artist" and "Ulysses". And the real life authors went to Paris and the Riviera. Proust simply stayed there.

Oscar Wilde said, "Good Americans go to Paris when they die." It is the only religious proposition in which I have faith and so I try to be good.

I may not know what I'm talking about here, but I think Paris was an idea for many people, and London had ceased to be one -- at least for Americans.

[[deleted user]]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fpoysh...


http://www.firstworldwar.com/audio/ho...

[Bill]

Bien sur.

I was thinking of that song the other day in the context of Nick Carraway's comments at the opening of Gatsby. Although Nick went to New York.

I think Leslie Fiedler said that in the 1920s artists went to Paris. In the 1960s they went to the mental hospital.

[Lily]

YouTube of Ponte Rialto (very amateurish, but gives a sense of the area, the steps, and the ambiance):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuX5Rh...

One can imagine Densher's room nearby.

http://europeforvisitors.com/venice/a...

Better picture, a bit of history, a traveler's viewpoint. (Has link to a second page of pictures.)

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=venice,...

Satellite view?

[Lily]

http://www.italyguides.it/us/venice_i...

Pretty good site for pictures of Venice. Have minimally explored a few of the links.

[[deleted user]]

Lily wrote: "Warning: the link below may be considered to contain SPOILER information by readers who have not completed WotD.

This critique can be rather rambling and disconnected, particularly with its many r..."

I must forgive "rambling and disconnected," LOL. Interesting read. I hadn't thought of the letter in terms of a fetish...but it is. That sad image of Densher carefully unwrapping it...in his mind...

I never read Paradise Lost, nor The Aspern Papers. Those remarks were more difficult to follow.

Thank you for posting the link.

[[deleted user]]

Lily wrote:

From this "Metaphor, Hysteria and th..."

I had to google Lacan. No idea.

I don't see Kate as showing Milly how to use non-satisfaction as a buffer or as an alternative to death.

I can sort of see that there is a difference between a lack of will to live and a will to die...but...without seeing Milly those last days...it's hard to judge.

The lines I really liked was:

"Now we can understand why Lord Mark’s avowal of Kate’s and Densher’s engagement was so damaging to Milly. Lord Mark didn’t tell Milly anything she didn’t already know, but he collapsed the distance between her knowledge and her belief"

That resonates as true.

[[deleted user]]

Lily wrote: "http://www.italyguides.it/us/venice_i...

Pretty good site for pictures of Venice. Have minimally explored a few of the links."

The bridgelinks were lovely! I especially liked the one with the violinist playing. That WOULD be a good place to sit and play. Were there a Densher, he might well have seen similar sights. Thank you for finding.

[MadgeUK]

OEED:
'Hysteria: 1 A wild uncontrollable emotion or excitement. 2 A functional disturbance of the nervous system of psychoneurotic origin (Mod.I hysteric).

Hysteric 1 (a) A fit of hysteria. (b) colloq. overwhelming mirth or laughter 2 a hysterical person (l.f. Gk husterikos of the womb [hustero] hysteria being thought to occur more frequently in women than in men and to be associated with the womb.'

[Lily]

In his collection of essays on Henry James, Colm Toibin describes how he combined personal experience, excerpts from letters, and tidbits from James's novels to create the fictional Henry James of his novel: The Master.