Henry James and Homo-Erotic Desire

by Bradley, John R.

• ISBN13: 9780312217648
• ISBN10: 0312217641
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-01-15
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

This collection of essays represents the first book to explore the complex influence of homosexuality on the life and fiction of Henry James. An extensive biographical introduction is complemented by an essay documenting James' friendships with younger men, which includes quotations from unpublished letters. Other subjects include the influence on James of the emergence of a specific concept of the homosexual in Victorian England and James' reactions to the aesthetic movement. New, often radical, perspectives on stories from all phases of James' career are also included.

Author Biography

John R. Bradley was educated at University College in London, Dartmouth College and Exeter College in Oxford and was editor of the London Quarterly from 1994-97.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	ix	(2)
Preface	xi	(2)
List of Contributors	xiii
1. Introduction	1	(24)
Sheldon M. Novick
2. James Amongst the Aesthetes	25	(20)
Richard Ellmann
3. Henry James's Permanent Adolescence	45	(24)
John R. Bradley
4. The Art of Friendship in Roderick Hudson	69	(10)
Gregory Woods
5. An Exchange of Gifts in The American	79	(8)
Cheryl B. Torsney
6. Failed Heterosexuality in The Portrait of a Lady	87	(6)
Robert K. Martin
7. A World of Female Friendship: The Bostonians	93	(18)
David Van Leer
8. Homo-Erotic Desire in the Tales of Writers and Artists	111	(14)
Leland S. Person
9. Dearly Beloved Friends: Henry James's Letters to Younger Men	125	(12)
Susan E. Gunter
Steven H. Jobe
10. Renunciations in James's Late Novels	137	(14)
Nicolas Buchele
Index	151