The Soft Side

by Henry James

The Great Good Place is a tale of the double nature in a single breast—a moving story that makes an appeal against the tyranny of affairs, of avoidable items of secondary importance as they afflict the social life of civilized man. An author, no longer able to cope with the complexities of his social and literary life, dreams of a great good place where quiet men live apart from the world and return to peace of mind. In "Europe" (1899) a passionate pilgrim longs for a voyage to the continent of her hopes and dreams, but is thwarted by the selfish intervention of her mother, who is determined to deny her daughter the wonderful experiences she herself once enjoyed. Paste is a Maupassant-like story of naked greed that becomes more powerful than even the sense of self-protection. In The Tree of Knowledge the artlessness of the works of a rich dilettante sculptor is secretly recognized by his family. To suit their own ends, however, the family members keep up the fiction of the artist's renown. The Abasement of the Northmores (1900) treats the caprices of posthumous fame. The Third Person (1900) is an ingenious story, tenderly told, of how two maiden ladies find their house to be haunted. In Maud-Evelyn, a young man is adopted into the household of an elderly couple still brooding over the death of their daughter. He falls into their emotional clutches and is accepted as their son-in-law, pretending to be the spouse of a still-living Maud-Evelyn.
Miss Gunton of Poughkeepsie (1900) is a rich American and moneyed flirt who tests the family of an Italian prince of ancient lineage before she will consent to marry him.

Nook

First published January 1, 1900

About the author

Henry James was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the son of Henry James Sr. and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James.
He is best known for his novels dealing with the social and marital interplay between émigré Americans, the English, and continental Europeans, such as The Portrait of a Lady. His later works, such as The Ambassadors, The Wings of the Dove and The Golden Bowl were increasingly experimental. In describing the internal states of mind and social dynamics of his characters, James often wrote in a style in which ambiguous or contradictory motives and impressions were overlaid or juxtaposed in the discussion of a character's psyche. For their unique ambiguity, as well as for other aspects of their composition, his late works have been compared to Impressionist painting.
His novella The Turn of the Screw has garnered a reputation as the most analysed and ambiguous ghost story in the English language and remains his most widely adapted work in other media. He wrote other highly regarded ghost stories, such as "The Jolly Corner".
James published articles and books of criticism, travel, biography, autobiography, and plays. Born in the United States, James largely relocated to Europe as a young man, and eventually settled in England, becoming a British citizen in 1915, a year before his death. James was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911, 1912, and 1916. Jorge Luis Borges said "I have visited some literatures of East and West; I have compiled an encyclopedic compendium of fantastic literature; I have translated Kafka, Melville, and Bloy; I know of no stranger work than that of Henry James."

Reviews

[Richard S · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful stories, full of surprises, the best stories are full of ghosts. I thought the Great Good Place and the Tree of Knowledge were the best of the lot.