Henry James: Selected Short Stories, the Last of the Valerii, the Real Thing, the Lesson of the Master, Daisy Miller

by Henry James

Contains four short stories:
The Last of the Valerii
The Real Thing
The Lesson of the Master
Daisy Miller

Edited and Introduction by Michael Swan

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Literature, Classics

Paperback

Published January 1, 1967

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

[Illiterate · Rating 2 out of 5]

Real Thing and Middle Years examine art. Georgina and Beaupre examine the marriage market. Orme is a ghost story.

[David Layton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Henry James has a great many admirers. I am not one of them. While plenty of critics praise his "subtlety" and "depth," I find that most of his writing is more trouble than it is worth. His narrators and characters are always hinting at things, but there seems to be nothing actually to hint about. The stories in this collection come from the early and middle periods of James's writing career, before he became, as H.G. Wells said it, "the old pretender." Even so, the hallmarks of the James "style" are here: long sentences filled with abstractions meant to convey that "something" is taking place, that "the real thing" is over there somewhere, and that some idea is maybe just perhaps crossing someone's mind. The first story of this collection, "The Last of the Valerii" is the earliest and least substantial. Here, James is still under the sway of Romanticism, attempting his own little Gothic tale. The story involves an Italian count who marries an American woman, but then neglects her when he has a statue of Juno dug up from his grounds. The Count comes to fall in love with and worship the perfect beauty of the statue, and the narrator, the poor wife's godfather, is left to cure the Count of his madness. The next story is to my mind the best of the four because it is about real people in real dilemmas. "The Real Thing" is about an artist who takes on as models two perfect specimens of 19th century beauty, a young couple clearly destitute but keeping up pretenses to be part of the social class to which they used to belong. The artist, however, finds that using these perfect models ruins his art, which is much better when he uses ordinary people and dresses them up as characters. The ending is quite poignant. My least favorite of the stories is "The Lesson of the Master." The first third of this story has all the problems of James's writing. The characters are all members of the idle rich who hang around in hotels and go to dinners and do no real work of any kind. Their conversation is insipid and it is very difficult to tell one from the other. Eventually, the actual story emerges of the young author who comes under the influence of an older famous author who believes he has betrayed his art by trying to live an ordinary life as a married man and still be a writer. The older writer betrays the younger one in a very obvious and telegraphed way, but "art" wins, so who is to complain? The last story is the most famous of the four, "Daisy Miller." This one focuses on another of James's favorite themes, the conflict between American values and European values. Here, James stereotypes in a less than subtle way. The young Daisy Miller is a brash, young American woman, daughter of a "new money" rich businessman, traveling Europe because there is really nothing else for her to do. The hero of the story is a slightly older young man, Winterbourne, American by birth but European by living in Europe most of his life. He watches, fascinated, while young Daisy gradually makes herself pariah in European high society without knowing about it, or caring about it when she is told. Again, we have a story of the 19th-century "boat set," or "hotel set," the idle rich casually passing judgment on each other. The main problem with James's writing for me is that the lessons of the stories are painfully obvious and not really worth all the trouble it takes to get them. Despite all James's fluffy language and philosophical-sounding abstracting, he is not really all that deep a writer.

[Carlos · Rating 2 out of 5]

I stumbled across this book at a library sale and I had heard enough about Henry James to pick it up. After finishing it, I have to admit that I am not impressed. I understand that a collection is always going to be a mixed bag but only one of the four short stories was mildly interesting. I can’t pin point to anything in particular that prevented me from enjoying the collection but in story after story I felt bored and unengaged. Perhaps other readers will find him more interesting.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

daisy miller you will always be famous

[Elizabete · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had trifted this edition of Henry James short stories quite a while ago. Now I have finally decided to pick it up, having no prior knowledge of these stories or H. James.
These selected stories are meant for readers who have never read James' works. Entertaining and easy to follow.

-The Last of the Valerii ⭐⭐⭐
-The Real Thing, and The Lesson of the Master ⭐

-Daisy Miller ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
I very much enjoyed this story. It's so my style. And the satisfying ending. <3
We follow the main character, Mr. Winterbourne. He is in Vevey, Switzerland, and one morning while enjoying his coffee and cigarette, he is introduced to a young woman, Daisy Miller, who is travelling with her brother, mother, and courier Eugenio. He instantly finds her charming and nice. But everyone around him says she is not as innocent as he finds her to be. Later, Miss Miller admits that her self.
''What a clever little reprobate she was, and how smartly she played an injured innocence!''

Overall: 2,5⭐ rounded up because I love Berthe Morisot's painting on the cover.

[Richard Clay · Rating 4 out of 5]

'The Last of the Valerii' has the same basic plot as 'Quatermass and the Pit' - to which it might almost be a prequel: ancient artefact dug up and it begins to affect the psychology of its discoverers. This being James, people do the sensible thing and reinter the thing before all manner of telekinetic massacre kicks off. People don't usually compare James to Nigel Kneale but it seems to me they were a pair of largely benevolent rationalist old darlings with more in common than might appear. 'The Real Thing', oddly enough, is also printed in the 'Aspern Papers' in the same series. If Penguin were mad keen that nobody failed to read this little cracker, I don't blame them. 'The Lesson of the Master' shows the influence of 'Middlemarch' only our hero doesn't wind up inappropriately married and gets on with his artistic quest. It's a bit Ayn Randish, but more soberly worded. For my money, the weak link here is Daisy Miller, which needed a bit of pruning to be rid of the kind of rambling that, post 1900, finally sunk James' talent.

[Igenlode Wordsmith · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remember reading the first of these stories as a child; I didn't like it, and I don't think I ever got any further into the book. I still don't like it, although it doesn't have quite the horror-filled finale that my childhood aversion had led me to anticipate.
According to the Introduction, Henry James was "the master of the tragic", and I suspect that sums up why I didn't care for the book; it is not very appealing to read through a series of stories about assorted discomfort and disappointment, whether vague or explicit. If anything, that first one probably comes closest to what would be described as a 'happy ending'!
They aren't even tragedies, as such. Just indefinably disquieting.

[Graham · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very different sort of book so quite hard to rate being a set of short stories. Some I enjoyed more than others, some sort of funny others make you think or make a point. Being old writing and language is quite different. But glad I read it having been to Henry James house. He sounds like an interesting character.

[Austin Wright · Rating 1 out of 5]

One of the worst books I've read....boring Victorian writing.

[Lora Templeton · Rating 3 out of 5]

I guess that Daisy Miller made the other three worth sitting through.

More to follow in this review.

[sofi · Rating 2 out of 5]

bostezo