Henry James, Impressionism, and the Public
Henry James, Impressionism, and the Public

Author: Daniel Hannah

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-04-22

Total Pages: 263

ISBN-13: 1317122550

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Proposing a new approach to Jamesian aesthetics, Daniel Hannah examines the complicated relationship between Henry James's impressionism and his handling of 'the public.' Hannah challenges solely phenomenological or pictorial accounts of literary impressionism, instead foregrounding James's treatment of the word 'impression' as a mediatory unit that both resists and accommodates invasive publicity. Thus even as he envisages a breakdown between public and private at the end of the nineteenth century, James registers that breakdown not only as a threat but also as an opportunity for aesthetic gain. Beginning with a reading of 'The Art of Fiction' as both a public-forming essay and an aesthetic manifesto, Hannah's study examines James's responses to painterly impressionism and to aestheticism, and offers original readings of What Maisie Knew, The Wings of the Dove, and The American Scene that treat James's articulation of impressionism in relation to the child, the future of the novel, and shifts in the American national imaginary. Hannah's study persuasively argues that throughout his career James returns to impressionability not only as a site of immense vulnerability in an age of rapid change but also as a crucible for reshaping, challenging, and adapting to the public sphere’s shifting forms.

The Theoretical Dimensions of Henry James
The Theoretical Dimensions of Henry James

Author: John Carlos Rowe

Publisher: Univ of Wisconsin Press

Published: 2009-08-27

Total Pages: 307

ISBN-13: 0299099733

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Rowe examines James from the perspectives of the psychology of literary influence, feminism, Marxism, psychoanalysis, literary phenomenology and impressionism, and reader-response criticism, transforming a literary monument into the telling point of intersection for modern critical theories.

Henry James and the Art of Impressions
Henry James and the Art of Impressions

Author: John Scholar

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2020-05-21

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 0192594923

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Henry James criticized the impressionism that was revolutionizing French painting and fiction. He satirized the British aesthetic movement whose keystone was impressionist criticism. So why, time and again in important parts of his literary work, did James use the word 'impression'? Henry James and the Art of Impressions argues that James tried to wrest the impression from the impressionists and to recast it in his own art of the novel. Interdisciplinary in its range, philosophical and literary in its focus, the book shows the place of James's work within the wider cultural history of impressionism. It draws on painting, philosophy, psychology, literature, and critical theory to examine James's art criticism, early literary criticism, travel writing, reflections on his own fiction, and the three great novels of his major phase, The Ambassadors, The Wings of the Dove, and The Golden Bowl. It shows how the language of impressions enables James to represent the most intense moments of consciousness of his characters. It argues that the Jamesian impression is best understood as a family of related ideas bound together by James's attempt to reconcile the novel's value as a mimetic form with its value as a transformative creative activity.

In Darkest James
In Darkest James

Author: Robin P. Hoople

Publisher: Bucknell University Press

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 314

ISBN-13: 9780838754535

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"In July of 1906 Archibald Henderson could pronounce with perfect confidence that Henry James was "a master impressionist." But as short a time as six years earlier, James's critics lacked this term in their vocabulary, and struggled with the sophisticated art of James's developing impressionistic literary technique. In Darkest James discusses the reviewer's frustrated, often irritated, and even anguished attempts to render a satisfactory account of the sequence of artifacts in which James moved toward the perfection of his craft."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Henry James and Pragmatistic Thought
Henry James and Pragmatistic Thought

Author: Richard A. Hocks

Publisher: UNC Press Books

Published: 2017-12-10

Total Pages: 342

ISBN-13: 1469640244

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This brilliant new study is the first comprehensive and penetrating exploration of the complex and important aesthetic and intellectual relationship between the Jameses. Hocks relates organically what William thought to how Henry thought, and his convincing argument becomes a profound examination of Henry's mind and the way in which his work dramatized a particular philosophical attitude through its unique and felicitous style. Originally published in 1974. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.