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HENRY JAMESS THE ART OF FICTION

This handout was prepared by Dr. William Tarvin, a retired professor of literature.Please visit my free websitewww.tarvinlit.com. Over 500 wors of !merican and "ritish

literature are analy#ed there for free.

Te$t used% &harles 'aplan and William David !nderson, eds. &riticism% (a)or*tatements, +thed. ew -or% "edford, 000.

1. /enry ames 12+341167 is one of !merica8s 9reatest novelists: his essay, ;The !rt of

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+7 On pa9e 36+, ames writes, ;>t 9oes without sayin9 that you will not write a9ood novel unless you possess the sense of reality= 36+7. >n a famous statement at theend of the essay 3E37, ames elaborates, be9innin9 ;G!ll life belon9s . . .= and endin9;. . . the colour of life itself= 3E37. *elect two main points which ames is main9 aboutthe reality which is to be imitated in the novel.

+. O"A&T>HA T/AOF-%

17 !s the editors write, ames ;re)ects a priori Iestablished beforehandJprescriptions and rules about how to write a novel= 3527. Which rules of the novel@based on a list by the critic Walter "esant@does ames mention on pa9e 36+B What isames8s attitude toward these rules 36+4657B

7 ames held that all parts of the novel must be seen to9ether as an or9anicwholeness. 'aplan and !nderson write, ;When ames declares that the novel is Ga livin9thin9, all one and continuous lie any other or9anism8 I366J, the vary simile reminds usof !ristotle= 3527.

37 ames maes two famous statements about this or9anic unity which a novelmust have%

On pa9e 3E0, he held that ;in proportion as Ia novelJ is successful,= the;idea Isimilar to themeJ permeates and penetrates it, informs and animates it, so thatevery word and every punctuation4point contribute directly to the e$pression= of theidea or theme.

On pa9e 36646E, addressin9 those who believed that aspects of the novel,such as description, dialo9ue, and action, could be separated, ames ass rhetorically,;What is character but the determination of incident IactionJB What is incident IactionJbut the illustration of characterB=

+7 On pa9e 352, the editors state that ames believed that ;critics and readers=can ;)ud9e a novelist I not by the sub)ect matter of the novel, butJ only by the Ge$ecution8I36EJ ,8 the Gtreatment,8 the renderin9 of the raw multitudinous materials of life into aunified word of art= 3527% ames writes% ;Of course it is of e$ecution that we aretalin9@that bein9 the only point of a novel that is open to contention= 36E7. Feaders;must 9rant the InovelistJ his sub)ect, his idea, his donnKe% our criticism is applied onlyto what he maes of it= 36E7.

57 !ccordin9 to 'aplan and !nderson, ames also ;re)ects traditional conceptsof plot= 3527. Fead pa9e 3E1 and summari#e ames8s critiues of a novel of action*tevenson8s Treasure >sland7 and a

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have 9ot so stran9ely twisted about, . . . is assumed to be opposed in some mysteriousmanner to morality, to amusement, to instruction= 3617.

7 On pa9e 36, list at least three of ames8s comment on what some ;peoplewho read novels as an e$ercise in sippin9= 367 feel mae a ;9ood= novel.

37 Therefore, as 'aplan and !nderson note, ;ames denies that the novel must

have a conscious moral purpose. On the contrary, what is commonly thou9ht of asmorality he defines as timidity@that is, the avoidance of certain Gimproper8 butnevertheless real sub)ects= 357% ames writes that for some the purpose of the novel is;to alter and arran9e the thin9s that surround us, to translate them into conventional,traditional moulds= 367. >nstead of real life, ;we are bein9 put off with a substitute, acompromise and convention= 367.

+7 The editors write that since ames ;re)ects limitations on the artists8 freedomof choice in respect to sub)ect matter and techniue= 3527, the novelists8 prospectivereaders also have the freedom to choose not to read the novel% ;Of course > may not carefor your idea at all: > may thin it silly, or stale, or unclean: in which case > wash my

hands of you alto9ether= 3627.

6. ALPFA**>HA T/AOF-

17 'aplan and !nderson write, ;Throu9hout the essay, ames stresses theartist8s necessary sensitivity to e$perience and the transformation of that e$perience bythe ima9ination= 3527.

7 On pa9e 365, ames stresses this sensitivity and ima9ination of the novelist%The novelist ahs the ;power to 9uess the unseen from the seen, to trace the implication

of thin9s, to )ud9e the whole by the pattern . . . . Therefore, if > should certainly say to anovice, GWrite from e$perience and e$perience only,8 > should feel Ithe needJ to add, GTryto be one of the people on whom nothin9 is lost18= 3657.

37 !s mentioned, the novelist must be 9ive artistic freedom% ;>f we pretend torespect the artist at all, we must allow him his freedom of choice= 3627, since ;!rtderives a considerable part of its beneficial e$ercise from flyin9 in the face ofpresumptions= 3627.

+7 &oncernin9 the novelist8s mind, ames writes that, ;o 9ood novel will everproceed from a superficial mind: that seems to me an a$iom which, for the artist offiction, will cover all needful moral 9round= 3E37.