Henry James1995
a literary life
by Kenneth Graham
This comprehensive account of the writing life of Henry James aims at providing a critical overview of all his important writings, firmly set in two contexts: that of James's practical career as a novelist in America, England and Europe; and that of the literary and intellectual climate of his time.
After paying particular attention to James's American upbringing and literary background, and to the role of Romanticism in his development, it examines the middle period of his writing - from The Portrait of a Lady to The Tragic Muse - to bring out the Victorian and, indeed, European aspects of this crucial period of his career.
Under the chapter heading 'Crisis and Experiment', it follows the decade of the 1890s during which James's radical experimentation with genre and style, allied to...