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The Spoils of Poynton
Mrs Gereth is convinced that Fleda Vetch would make the perfect daughter-in-law. Only the dreamy, highly-strung young woman can genuinely appreciate, and perhaps eventually share, Mrs Gereth's passion for her 'things' - the antique treasures she has amassed at Poynton Park in the south of England. Owen Gereth, however, has inconveniently become engaged to the uncultured Mona Brigstock. As a dramatic family quarrel unfolds, the hesitating Fleda is drawn in, yet she remains reluctant to captivate Owen, who seems as attracted to her as she is to him. Is she motivated by scruple or fear? In The Spoils of Poynton (1897), Henry James created a work of exquisite ambiguity in his depiction of three women fighting for the allegiance of one weak-willed man.
256 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 1896
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About the author
Henry James
4,557 books3,944 followersHenry 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."
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."
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November 7, 2017"My name is Fleda Vetch and I'm the main character of The Spoils of Poynton. That is to say, I appear to be the main character but the truth is, Mrs Gereth of Poynton Hall takes firm possession of that status early in the story. Mrs Gereth likes taking possession of things and I like giving them up. In fact, if my overly developed sense of humility didn't prevent it, I would claim my place as the most put-upon character in literary history, for not only has my main character status been usurped, I've also been saddled with an atrocious name and an impossibly rigorous sense of duty, one which invariably forces me to choose the stony path instead of the smooth one. Henry James must have been in a grey mood the day he decided to insert me into his Poynton tale. I've read his notes for the story and I'm fully aware that I was an afterthought, not part of the original plan. He needed someone to act as a go-between, and so, sadly for me, I was brought into existence.
I started out life in a rather promising way; I was an artist, with a well developed aesthetic sense, and I had plans to go to Paris to study painting. I was excited about that life when I first heard about it but then I discovered that James had made me completely penniless, so his dangling that possibility before me became just another of his cruelties. Any chance of going to Paris, even to starve in a garret, was soon written out of the story in any case. On the third page, as I was sitting in an obscure corner of a friend's garden, minding my modest business as usual, Henry James allowed Mrs Gereth of Poynton Hall to descend upon me in all her pent-up fury. Like me, she was a guest at the friend's house and she hated everything about it, the wallpaper, the furniture, the ornaments, but especially the people who owned it. It didn't help that her son appeared to be romantically interested in one of the daughters of the house.
For some odd reason, Mrs Gereth thought I felt the same way about the house and the people as she did. She never actually asked me, she just presumed I shared her feelings completely. A few pages later, I'd been whisked off to stay with her at Poynton Hall, and that's how I came to be the unhappy go-between in the conflict that arose when Mrs Gereth's son announced he was getting married to the girl from the house with the wallpaper Mrs Gereth couldn't abide.
When I got to Poynton, I understood about the wallpaper of course. Mrs Gereth had been a collector of art all her life. Her home was a mini museum full of paintings, tapestries, precious artifacts, antique furniture, in short, beauties beyond my wildest dreams. Collecting and caring for her treasures had been her life's work and she loved them more than anything, certainly more than her only son. However, the late Mr Gereth had left his property to the son, and in accordance with English law, Mrs Gereth was obliged to leave Poynton Hall, together with all its treasures, as soon as her son decided to marry. If you think you can imagine the trauma that ensued thereafter for everyone concerned, you're wrong, and certainly don't count on me to fill you in; I lived through it once, I could not bear to live through it again.
So if, if, you still want to know what happened to the Spoils of Poynton, you'll have to read the book for yourself. The single mercy Henry James granted me was to make it short."
I started out life in a rather promising way; I was an artist, with a well developed aesthetic sense, and I had plans to go to Paris to study painting. I was excited about that life when I first heard about it but then I discovered that James had made me completely penniless, so his dangling that possibility before me became just another of his cruelties. Any chance of going to Paris, even to starve in a garret, was soon written out of the story in any case. On the third page, as I was sitting in an obscure corner of a friend's garden, minding my modest business as usual, Henry James allowed Mrs Gereth of Poynton Hall to descend upon me in all her pent-up fury. Like me, she was a guest at the friend's house and she hated everything about it, the wallpaper, the furniture, the ornaments, but especially the people who owned it. It didn't help that her son appeared to be romantically interested in one of the daughters of the house.
For some odd reason, Mrs Gereth thought I felt the same way about the house and the people as she did. She never actually asked me, she just presumed I shared her feelings completely. A few pages later, I'd been whisked off to stay with her at Poynton Hall, and that's how I came to be the unhappy go-between in the conflict that arose when Mrs Gereth's son announced he was getting married to the girl from the house with the wallpaper Mrs Gereth couldn't abide.
When I got to Poynton, I understood about the wallpaper of course. Mrs Gereth had been a collector of art all her life. Her home was a mini museum full of paintings, tapestries, precious artifacts, antique furniture, in short, beauties beyond my wildest dreams. Collecting and caring for her treasures had been her life's work and she loved them more than anything, certainly more than her only son. However, the late Mr Gereth had left his property to the son, and in accordance with English law, Mrs Gereth was obliged to leave Poynton Hall, together with all its treasures, as soon as her son decided to marry. If you think you can imagine the trauma that ensued thereafter for everyone concerned, you're wrong, and certainly don't count on me to fill you in; I lived through it once, I could not bear to live through it again.
So if, if, you still want to know what happened to the Spoils of Poynton, you'll have to read the book for yourself. The single mercy Henry James granted me was to make it short."
April 11, 2011
Virginia Woolf in a letter to Violet Dickinson, 25 August 1907 :
"Well then, we went and had tea with Henry James today…and Henry James fixed me with his staring blank eye — it is like a childs marble — and said ‘My dear Virginia, they tell me — they tell me — they tell me — that you — as indeed being your fathers daughter - nay your grandfather's grandchild — the descendant I may say of a century — of a century — of quill pens and ink — ink — ink pots, yes, yes, yes, they tell me — ahm - mm — that you, that you, that you write in short.’ This went on in the public street, while we all waited, as farmers wait for the hen to lay an egg — do they? — nervous, polite, and now on this foot now on that."
"Well then, we went and had tea with Henry James today…and Henry James fixed me with his staring blank eye — it is like a childs marble — and said ‘My dear Virginia, they tell me — they tell me — they tell me — that you — as indeed being your fathers daughter - nay your grandfather's grandchild — the descendant I may say of a century — of a century — of quill pens and ink — ink — ink pots, yes, yes, yes, they tell me — ahm - mm — that you, that you, that you write in short.’ This went on in the public street, while we all waited, as farmers wait for the hen to lay an egg — do they? — nervous, polite, and now on this foot now on that."
July 28, 2023
Начало романа было, как типичный любовный роман с классическим треугольником (Оуэн - Мона Бригсток - Фледа) и бесцеремонно вклинившейся в него матерью, миссис Герит с юридически нечётко обоснованными претензиями на имущественные права на произведения искусства в их родовом поместье Пойнтон, покупавшимися ею за счёт средств умершего мужа, но унаследованными после его смерти ее сыном. Автор пытался поднять вопрос о том, что законы Англии оставляли вдов бесправными и лишенными имущества.
Сын, чтобы не выглядеть неблагодарным, позволил матери взять часть произведений искусства из Пойнтона, но она вывезла в скромный домик, в котором она отныне должна была жить, всё, вплоть до мебели и постельного белья.
Перед Оуэном дилемма - то ли решать вопрос в судебном порядке, то ли, раз Мона проявляет сугубо материальный интерес к нему, расстаться с ней.
Тут весьма кстати подворачивается Фледа Ветч, юная леди из бедной семьи, но образованная, тонко чувствующая искусство и красоту. Она с одной стороны интригует, ведя свою игру и с матерью и с сыном, основанную на противопоставлении своей якобы бескорыстности (понятно, что в случае успеха, она станет хозяйкой сокровищ Пойнтона и от ее действий сильно отдает лицемерием, хотя, разумеется, она говорит, что любит Оуэна) очевидной алчности и расчета Моны, а с другой пытается вести себя в рамках принципов благородства и высоких моральных устоев.
Миссис Герит делает ставку на то, что раз уж ее сын сделал предложение Фледе, стало быть дело решенное, и возвращает вещи в Пойнтон. Она советовала Фледе "дать себе волю", подразумевая под этим эвфемизмом переспать с ним, чтобы связать намертво. Но Фледа "дала себе волю" иначе, отправив Оуэна разобраться в себе, кого он всё-таки любит.
Так Оуэн оказался в хищных объятиях Моны, о чем они прочитали в разделе брачных объявлений в утренней газете.
Помимо ущемленных прав вдов, автор прямо называет мещанством дрязги при разделе имущества, хотя юридически все права собственности были у Оуэна, а также голый расчет в матримониальных вопросах. Очевидно, есть сомнения в том, что и Фледа ничем не лучше Моны, просто она позиционирует себя, как возвышенную и благородную особу.
В романе есть и интрига, и неожиданная развязка, но все же он не дотягивает до высоких оценок.
Сын, чтобы не выглядеть неблагодарным, позволил матери взять часть произведений искусства из Пойнтона, но она вывезла в скромный домик, в котором она отныне должна была жить, всё, вплоть до мебели и постельного белья.
Перед Оуэном дилемма - то ли решать вопрос в судебном порядке, то ли, раз Мона проявляет сугубо материальный интерес к нему, расстаться с ней.
Тут весьма кстати подворачивается Фледа Ветч, юная леди из бедной семьи, но образованная, тонко чувствующая искусство и красоту. Она с одной стороны интригует, ведя свою игру и с матерью и с сыном, основанную на противопоставлении своей якобы бескорыстности (понятно, что в случае успеха, она станет хозяйкой сокровищ Пойнтона и от ее действий сильно отдает лицемерием, хотя, разумеется, она говорит, что любит Оуэна) очевидной алчности и расчета Моны, а с другой пытается вести себя в рамках принципов благородства и высоких моральных устоев.
Миссис Герит делает ставку на то, что раз уж ее сын сделал предложение Фледе, стало быть дело решенное, и возвращает вещи в Пойнтон. Она советовала Фледе "дать себе волю", подразумевая под этим эвфемизмом переспать с ним, чтобы связать намертво. Но Фледа "дала себе волю" иначе, отправив Оуэна разобраться в себе, кого он всё-таки любит.
Так Оуэн оказался в хищных объятиях Моны, о чем они прочитали в разделе брачных объявлений в утренней газете.
Помимо ущемленных прав вдов, автор прямо называет мещанством дрязги при разделе имущества, хотя юридически все права собственности были у Оуэна, а также голый расчет в матримониальных вопросах. Очевидно, есть сомнения в том, что и Фледа ничем не лучше Моны, просто она позиционирует себя, как возвышенную и благородную особу.
В романе есть и интрига, и неожиданная развязка, но все же он не дотягивает до высоких оценок.
November 20, 2023
Romancierul american Henry James impresioneaza din nou cu aceasta carte avand o tematica deosebita. Interesant este ca nu avem o poveste clasica de dragoste ci una in care iubirea se naste si depinde de factorii din exterior. In romanul de fata, atat oamenii cat si sentimentele lor se invart in jurul fabulosului domeniu care poarta denumirea de Poynton. El leaga si dezleaga destinele personajelor fiind un simbol al perfectiunii.
Autorul pastreaza si aici limbajul usor satiric cu care ne-a obisnuit, astfel incat chiar mi l-am imaginat zambind ironic, atunci cand scria, la efectele si reactiile pe care opera sa le va produce cititorilor. De asemenea, este prima data cand la un roman, daca nu as fi stiut cine este autorul, as fi spus ca apartine unei femei, intr-atat de buna este cunoasterea si abordarea psihologica a personajului principal.
La fel ca in majoritatea operelor sale, Henry James revine la tema desarvarsirii; daca in "Americanul" vorbeam despre femeia desavarsita, aici vorbim despre Poynton - locul desavarsit, suprem din toate punctele de vedere, o adevarata opera de arta. Si aici, personajele sunt inteligente cu o conversatie spumoasa, ironica, provocatoare, lipsita de cotidian sau banalitate. Asa este si eroina cartii, Felda Vetch a carei minte este o comoara la fel ca Poyntonul. Desi nu este iesit din comun de frumoasa, lumea crede despre ea ca are un "flair" extraordinar. Fiind simpatizata de doamna Gereth, cu ocazia casatoriei fiului ei Owen, Felda este prinsa la mijloc intre cei doi. Mona, viitoarea nora este considerata vulgara si nepriceputa pentru a stapani domeniul familiei.
Duelul crancen, abordat satiric, dintre soacra si nora are ca obiect Poyntonul la care mama lui Owen ar trebui sa renunte. Felda este nevoita sa medieze acest conflict in care ajunge sa se indragosteasca atat de obiectele de arta cat si de Owen. Problema este cu atat mai mare cu cat maretul Poynton ar trebui sa se incline in favoarea lipsei de gust a norei.
Atunci cand doamna Gereth pleaca cu toate lucrurile din casa iar nora refuza din aceasta pricina casatoria, destinul ii intinde Feldei o sansa nesperata la iubirea lui Owen. Cu toate acestea, ea doreste sa fie corecta pana la final si vrea ca Owen sa-si indeplineasca datoriile morale. Aceasta tematica o regasim si la Edith Wharton in "The age of innocence" iar eroina noastra se aseamana mult cu Lily din "House of mirth" de aceeasi autoare.
Finalul poate ca nu va fi pe placul multor cititori si vine ca o pedeapsa morala pe care Henry James o aplica de multe ori in cartile sale. (focul, distrugerea Poyntonului, purificarea)Vorbeste despre puterea de a renunta si de a trai fara lucrurile materiale considerate de pret si gasirea impacarii in alte moduri.
Ca o remarca, de fiecare data dupa ce terminam de citit romanele lui Henry James si reflectam asupra lor, putem spune ca ne-am ascutit spiritul, mintea si simtul de observatie. Ne-am deschis intr-un final ochii.
Autorul pastreaza si aici limbajul usor satiric cu care ne-a obisnuit, astfel incat chiar mi l-am imaginat zambind ironic, atunci cand scria, la efectele si reactiile pe care opera sa le va produce cititorilor. De asemenea, este prima data cand la un roman, daca nu as fi stiut cine este autorul, as fi spus ca apartine unei femei, intr-atat de buna este cunoasterea si abordarea psihologica a personajului principal.
La fel ca in majoritatea operelor sale, Henry James revine la tema desarvarsirii; daca in "Americanul" vorbeam despre femeia desavarsita, aici vorbim despre Poynton - locul desavarsit, suprem din toate punctele de vedere, o adevarata opera de arta. Si aici, personajele sunt inteligente cu o conversatie spumoasa, ironica, provocatoare, lipsita de cotidian sau banalitate. Asa este si eroina cartii, Felda Vetch a carei minte este o comoara la fel ca Poyntonul. Desi nu este iesit din comun de frumoasa, lumea crede despre ea ca are un "flair" extraordinar. Fiind simpatizata de doamna Gereth, cu ocazia casatoriei fiului ei Owen, Felda este prinsa la mijloc intre cei doi. Mona, viitoarea nora este considerata vulgara si nepriceputa pentru a stapani domeniul familiei.
Duelul crancen, abordat satiric, dintre soacra si nora are ca obiect Poyntonul la care mama lui Owen ar trebui sa renunte. Felda este nevoita sa medieze acest conflict in care ajunge sa se indragosteasca atat de obiectele de arta cat si de Owen. Problema este cu atat mai mare cu cat maretul Poynton ar trebui sa se incline in favoarea lipsei de gust a norei.
Atunci cand doamna Gereth pleaca cu toate lucrurile din casa iar nora refuza din aceasta pricina casatoria, destinul ii intinde Feldei o sansa nesperata la iubirea lui Owen. Cu toate acestea, ea doreste sa fie corecta pana la final si vrea ca Owen sa-si indeplineasca datoriile morale. Aceasta tematica o regasim si la Edith Wharton in "The age of innocence" iar eroina noastra se aseamana mult cu Lily din "House of mirth" de aceeasi autoare.
Finalul poate ca nu va fi pe placul multor cititori si vine ca o pedeapsa morala pe care Henry James o aplica de multe ori in cartile sale. (focul, distrugerea Poyntonului, purificarea)Vorbeste despre puterea de a renunta si de a trai fara lucrurile materiale considerate de pret si gasirea impacarii in alte moduri.
Ca o remarca, de fiecare data dupa ce terminam de citit romanele lui Henry James si reflectam asupra lor, putem spune ca ne-am ascutit spiritul, mintea si simtul de observatie. Ne-am deschis intr-un final ochii.
January 9, 2023
'Did you really believe that? That I would finish my 2022 reading year without picking up another novel by one of my all-time favorite writers?'
That was, more or less, what I said to a friend of mine when he noticed it had been a while since the last time I read a novel by Henry James. Perhaps it is because I usually talk a lot about his oeuvre that it seems kind of odd when I'm not reading anything by him. I don't know. The point is that I really wanted to read some of his stuff again, something short and minor, so to speak, before the end of the year. That was the moment when I made up my mind to pick up The Spoils of Poynton.
The Spoils of Poynton is, in my view, a weird yet fascinating book, actually the weirdest one I have read by Henry James so far. Perhaps 'weird' is too much to describe this story, however, I truly believe you have to love both his narrative and his stories, and be really committed to reading them from cover to cover, in order for you to enjoy this particular one. This is by no means a novel to kick off your James journey with, and let me explain why, in spite of its length, this book was harder to read than, let's say, The Wings of the Dove or The Golden Bowl.
When it comes to Henry James' books, the thing is to remember that the older the author got—will this also have something to do with the fact that he used to dictate his stories rather than write them by himself when he was almost 60?—the more difficult and more confusing his novels became. Books such as The Ambassadors and The Golden Bowl are usually more challenging because of their prose that is quite ambiguous, verbose, and at times confusing, whereas stories like Washington Square and The Aspern Papers are mostly straightforward and easy to follow (in terms of Henry James' style of writing, of course). So, eventually everything comes down to an important question: which group does The Spoils of Poynton belong to? And here you have the main problem you can find while reading this novel: it belongs either to the first group, to the second group, or to both groups.
The fact that The Spoils of Poynton is like a combination of both worlds, so to speak, shouldn't be an issue beforehand, however, the plot is not really engaging, nor is it interesting enough for you to keep reading—don't get me wrong, it was riveting for me indeed, though, objectively speaking, I don't think it would be like that for everyone—and the prose is not even easy to read to make your reading experience better. Therefore, The Spoils of Poynton becomes a story that fails to be both a challenging, yet rewarding reading experience, and an entertaining, straight-to-the-point story. That being said, I must accept my reality: I mostly enjoyed reading this book from beginning to end, but maybe because I'm a big fan of James' stories, and especially a bigger fan of his final novels—I believe I'm going to enjoy every single piece of literature written by this man.
As for the plot, it is simple yet boundless, since it is open to a number of interpretations by the end of the story: a mother wants to preserve their memories by keeping some objects that, from the moment his son gets married on, will be taken away from her (since Poynton—her house—along with her treasures will be owned only by his son and his future wife). She doesn't like her future daughter-in-law either, and as a matter of fact, she wants his son to get married to Fleda Vetch, our real protagonist who is a gentle, kind woman and a good friend of the mother; therefore, she (the mother) will do everything in her power to help Fleda end up being together with her son—the question is, will she make it happen?
I haven't explain yet why The Spoils of Poynton was harder to read than, for instance, The Golden Bowl and less enjoyable than Washington Square, have I? Well, simply because its narrative is not as impressive as the narrative of The Golden Bowl, and its plot is not as straightforward as Washington Square's plot. It was not harder to read because of its difficulty, but because it is tricky to enjoy the journey, and even though the destiny—the ending—was so good and quite symbolic, the things that happened in between were not that memorable. That said, again, you know me—do you?—Henry James has become, throughout the past two years, an all-time favorite of mine and I will always be biased towards him as a writer. If I recommend you read this book? Yes, as long as you love him too (as an author, I mean).
“He clasped her, and she gave herself – she poured out her tears on his breast. Something prisoned and pent throbbed and gushed; something deep and sweet surged up – something that came from far within and far off, that had begun with the sight of him in his indifference and had never had rest since then."
That was, more or less, what I said to a friend of mine when he noticed it had been a while since the last time I read a novel by Henry James. Perhaps it is because I usually talk a lot about his oeuvre that it seems kind of odd when I'm not reading anything by him. I don't know. The point is that I really wanted to read some of his stuff again, something short and minor, so to speak, before the end of the year. That was the moment when I made up my mind to pick up The Spoils of Poynton.
The Spoils of Poynton is, in my view, a weird yet fascinating book, actually the weirdest one I have read by Henry James so far. Perhaps 'weird' is too much to describe this story, however, I truly believe you have to love both his narrative and his stories, and be really committed to reading them from cover to cover, in order for you to enjoy this particular one. This is by no means a novel to kick off your James journey with, and let me explain why, in spite of its length, this book was harder to read than, let's say, The Wings of the Dove or The Golden Bowl.
When it comes to Henry James' books, the thing is to remember that the older the author got—will this also have something to do with the fact that he used to dictate his stories rather than write them by himself when he was almost 60?—the more difficult and more confusing his novels became. Books such as The Ambassadors and The Golden Bowl are usually more challenging because of their prose that is quite ambiguous, verbose, and at times confusing, whereas stories like Washington Square and The Aspern Papers are mostly straightforward and easy to follow (in terms of Henry James' style of writing, of course). So, eventually everything comes down to an important question: which group does The Spoils of Poynton belong to? And here you have the main problem you can find while reading this novel: it belongs either to the first group, to the second group, or to both groups.
The fact that The Spoils of Poynton is like a combination of both worlds, so to speak, shouldn't be an issue beforehand, however, the plot is not really engaging, nor is it interesting enough for you to keep reading—don't get me wrong, it was riveting for me indeed, though, objectively speaking, I don't think it would be like that for everyone—and the prose is not even easy to read to make your reading experience better. Therefore, The Spoils of Poynton becomes a story that fails to be both a challenging, yet rewarding reading experience, and an entertaining, straight-to-the-point story. That being said, I must accept my reality: I mostly enjoyed reading this book from beginning to end, but maybe because I'm a big fan of James' stories, and especially a bigger fan of his final novels—I believe I'm going to enjoy every single piece of literature written by this man.
As for the plot, it is simple yet boundless, since it is open to a number of interpretations by the end of the story: a mother wants to preserve their memories by keeping some objects that, from the moment his son gets married on, will be taken away from her (since Poynton—her house—along with her treasures will be owned only by his son and his future wife). She doesn't like her future daughter-in-law either, and as a matter of fact, she wants his son to get married to Fleda Vetch, our real protagonist who is a gentle, kind woman and a good friend of the mother; therefore, she (the mother) will do everything in her power to help Fleda end up being together with her son—the question is, will she make it happen?
I haven't explain yet why The Spoils of Poynton was harder to read than, for instance, The Golden Bowl and less enjoyable than Washington Square, have I? Well, simply because its narrative is not as impressive as the narrative of The Golden Bowl, and its plot is not as straightforward as Washington Square's plot. It was not harder to read because of its difficulty, but because it is tricky to enjoy the journey, and even though the destiny—the ending—was so good and quite symbolic, the things that happened in between were not that memorable. That said, again, you know me—do you?—Henry James has become, throughout the past two years, an all-time favorite of mine and I will always be biased towards him as a writer. If I recommend you read this book? Yes, as long as you love him too (as an author, I mean).
“He clasped her, and she gave herself – she poured out her tears on his breast. Something prisoned and pent throbbed and gushed; something deep and sweet surged up – something that came from far within and far off, that had begun with the sight of him in his indifference and had never had rest since then."
June 2, 2018
The Spoils of Poynton (1897) is an object of high craftsmanship and beauty, as polished as the choice bibelots that fuel the novel’s plot through the acquisitive desires they stoke. James wrote it shortly after a traumatic episode in his would-be career as a dramatist, when he was booed off the stage at the opening night of his historical drama Guy Domville. In his fascinating diary notes tracking its composition (included in the Penguin Classics edition), he presents The Spoils of Poynton as an attempt to salvage something, in artistic terms, from this crushing experience.
I found that an interesting way to think about the novel—as a kind of novelized play, leaning heavily on extended dialogue scenes to carry forward its slight but perfectly formed plot. The cast-list is chamber size: principally, the widowed Mrs Gereth, her son, Owen, and her companion, the unfortunately named Fleda Vetch. Less physically present in the novel, but a looming presence offstage is the young woman Owen plans to marry, Mona Brigstock, whom the super-refined aesthete Mrs Gereth regards as a vulgarian barbarian at the gate.
The remaining major characters are houses: the beautiful, Jacobean Poynton Hall, where Mrs Gereth lived out her married life and assembled her exquisite collection of furniture and tapestries, and the modest dower-house cottage Ricks, to which she is expected to uproot herself when Owen and Mona move into Poynton. The thought of abandoning her beloved possessions to Mona fires Mrs Gereth to a ruthless campaign of resistance, which includes an attempt to weaponize Fleda as an alternative, more acceptable daughter-in-law.
James uses this structure to explore the passions associated with ownership and material possession (the blunter title of the novel’s original, serial publication, in The Atlantic Monthly, was “The Old Things.”) Mrs Gereth’s attachment to her cherished collection is as fierce as we like to think of the maternal instinct being, leaving her actual maternal feelings for Owen well in the rear. Her possessions are extensions and reflections of her identity, the physical manifestation of the fastidious taste that underscores her superiority to the Brigstocks of this world. More sympathetically viewed, they are memory incarnate: the sediment of her long and happy married life and a collecting passion she shared with her husband (“There are things in the house we almost starved for!” she reminds Owen at one point. “They were our religion, they were our life, they were us!”)
Mrs Gereth is a wonderfully ambiguous character—but the same could be said of Fleda; indeed, on the evidence of the introduction to my edition, she has elicited wildly diverse responses from critics over the decades. Some have seen her as James’s alter ego in the novel, all super-refined, quivering aesthetic and moral sensibility, while others regard her as a “stumbling bungler,” whose moral scruples mask a kind of pusillanimity, a reluctance to grasp life with both hands. I can see grounds for both readings, and I’m not sure at all that the two are incompatible. Fleda is clearly some kind of authorial self-portrait, but not necessarily a flattering one—indeed, almost self-lacerating in some ways.
I found that an interesting way to think about the novel—as a kind of novelized play, leaning heavily on extended dialogue scenes to carry forward its slight but perfectly formed plot. The cast-list is chamber size: principally, the widowed Mrs Gereth, her son, Owen, and her companion, the unfortunately named Fleda Vetch. Less physically present in the novel, but a looming presence offstage is the young woman Owen plans to marry, Mona Brigstock, whom the super-refined aesthete Mrs Gereth regards as a vulgarian barbarian at the gate.
The remaining major characters are houses: the beautiful, Jacobean Poynton Hall, where Mrs Gereth lived out her married life and assembled her exquisite collection of furniture and tapestries, and the modest dower-house cottage Ricks, to which she is expected to uproot herself when Owen and Mona move into Poynton. The thought of abandoning her beloved possessions to Mona fires Mrs Gereth to a ruthless campaign of resistance, which includes an attempt to weaponize Fleda as an alternative, more acceptable daughter-in-law.
James uses this structure to explore the passions associated with ownership and material possession (the blunter title of the novel’s original, serial publication, in The Atlantic Monthly, was “The Old Things.”) Mrs Gereth’s attachment to her cherished collection is as fierce as we like to think of the maternal instinct being, leaving her actual maternal feelings for Owen well in the rear. Her possessions are extensions and reflections of her identity, the physical manifestation of the fastidious taste that underscores her superiority to the Brigstocks of this world. More sympathetically viewed, they are memory incarnate: the sediment of her long and happy married life and a collecting passion she shared with her husband (“There are things in the house we almost starved for!” she reminds Owen at one point. “They were our religion, they were our life, they were us!”)
Mrs Gereth is a wonderfully ambiguous character—but the same could be said of Fleda; indeed, on the evidence of the introduction to my edition, she has elicited wildly diverse responses from critics over the decades. Some have seen her as James’s alter ego in the novel, all super-refined, quivering aesthetic and moral sensibility, while others regard her as a “stumbling bungler,” whose moral scruples mask a kind of pusillanimity, a reluctance to grasp life with both hands. I can see grounds for both readings, and I’m not sure at all that the two are incompatible. Fleda is clearly some kind of authorial self-portrait, but not necessarily a flattering one—indeed, almost self-lacerating in some ways.
July 25, 2016
Leon Edel sees in The Spoils of Poynton "James's first attempt to use his scenic method and his playwriting techniques." Unluckily for us James was an indifferent playwright and such techniques--along with a laughably puritanical conception of character--are responsible for this suffocatingly miniature novel.
There are no vistas beyond Poynton, the dowager cottage, and a few undifferentiated London streets and furnished rooms. The action, such as it is, takes place on the tensed communicatory wires that make a triangle of Mrs. Gereth, her adversarial son Owen, and their ambivalent go-between, Fleda Vetch (the ugliest Jamesian name I've encountered, though I hear there's a character named Fanny Assingham in The Ambassadors). While immersed in the really excruciating middle of the book, in the tortuous exchanges between the impassive, nearly-simpleminded Owen and the quietly turbid Fleda, I tried, as an experiment, to convince myself that James was proposing a starkly staged, stylishly minimal, Kafkaesque proto-modernist chamber novel. But reading it I just felt claustrophobic.
My other annoyance--the puritanical conception of character--lies with what James chose to grow from this germ of dinner party gossip:
...an odd matter as that a good lady in the north, always well looked on, was at daggers drawn with her only son, ever hitherto exemplary, over the ownership of the valuable furniture of a fine old house just accruing to the young man by this father's death...
That heard-of woman became the Mrs. Gereth of this novel. She is a poet of interiors, Poynton her poem:
There had been in the first place the exquisite old house itself, early Jacobean, supreme in every part: it was a provocation, an inspiration, a matchless canvas for the picture. Then there had been her husband’s sympathy and generosity, his knowledge and love, their perfect accord and beautiful life together, twenty-six years of planning and seeking, a long, sunny harvest of taste and curiosity. Lastly, she never denied, there had been her personal gift, the genius, the passion, the patience of the collector – a patience, an almost infernal cunning, that had enabled her to do it all with a limited command of money.
Poynton was the record of a life. It was written in great syllables of colour and form, the tongues of other countries and the hands of rare artists. It was all France and Italy, with their ages composed to rest. For England you looked out of old windows – it was England that was the wide embrace.
Mrs. Gereth is faced with eviction from this personal treasure house, this essential stage, because of her son's imminent marriage to a tasteless frump. Her confidant is Fleda Vetch. Fleda's humble and humane taste is a perfect foil for Mrs. Gereth's Olympian aestheticism. Unlike Mrs. Gereth, Fleda has access to the sentimental and associative reasons that explain how "by certain natures, hideous objects can be loved" (on a exploratory visit to the dowager cottage, Mrs. Gereth sees only ugliness; Fleda is deeply touched by the life of the previous tenant as revealed by the leftover decoration and belongings). Fleda is even able to see the loveliness in Owen Gereth, a guileless, slightly boorish dolt in his mother's eyes.
So yeah, sounds great. The first third of the novel read much like The Tragic Muse. That novel portrayed the practice of art "as a human complication and social stumbling block," and I thought The Spoils of Poynton might continue its dramatic analysis of the difficulties that arise in the lives of people who live and judge only by aesthetic values. Mrs. Gereth's deepest love and pride is her practice of a perishable and generally ignored art. The co-existence of imperious aesthetic judgment and the necessarily selfless emotions of motherhood, within a single woman, seemed a rich subject.
But James turns to the story to Fleda. Which is what he intended all along. Scrutinizing the preface for reasons why the novel so bugged me, I found James saying that, from the moment of conception, he intended Mrs. Gereth and her son to be mindless drivers of action, fools, "fools who minister, at a particular crisis, to the intensity of the free spirit engaged with them." The free spirit, the moral pivot, being Fleda. To some of his contemporary critics and immediately posthumous detractors, James was the caricature of the fussy arch-aesthete. But he is actually quite suspicious of aestheticism. Some of his facetious, shallow, mildly villainous aesthetes--Gabriel Nash in The Tragic Muse, Osmond in The Portrait of a Lady--exist to furnish a contrast and a provocation to the deeper natures of Nick Dormer and Isabel Archer. He wasn't ever going to take a Mrs. Gereth seriously; as he says in the preface, she was to be a "figure" rather than a character, "clever" rather than "intelligent."
In the preface James admits the slightly absurd presumption, the unrealism, of furnishing every situation with a morally admirable character, with a "free spirit," with a Fleda to act as the "ground of appeal" and perching-place of readerly sympathy. And this is what I mean by James's puritanism. Sure, Fleda is nicer than Mrs. Gereth, but she isn't more interesting. This is the same staid moralism that produced the strange tone of The Aspern Papers, in which the narrator is duplicitous and scheming, but James can't impersonate his duplicitous or scheming voice. James was so much less sophisticated than we like to think. He was grateful for admittance to the Flaubert cenacle, for the chance to overhear and participate in the shop-talk of Flaubert, Edmond de Goncourt, Daudet--but while he admired the artistry of their novels, he privately recoiled from the squalor of their plots and the pessimism of their tone. Writing the full story of Mrs. Gereth would have presented no moral difficulty to any of his continental contemporaries. And after the century of Leopold Bloom and Humbert Humbert, the moral requirement to insert and aggrandize a Fleda Vetch seems pretty ridiculous.
But my complaints mean nothing if Fleda worked as a character. But she doesn't. She was well-designed as a companion to Mrs. Gereth, even as the eyes through which we saw Mrs. Gereth...but the love story, the hand wringing agonies and renunciations with Owen are just weak. The Notebooks show that The Spoils of Poynton was conceived as a short story, a short story that over time distended to novel size. A shame. As a story concentrated on Mrs. Gereth, even one with the claustrophobic playwriting effect, this would have worked. Instead we get the bloated and obtrusive story of Fleda Vetch. What a miserable botch!
There are no vistas beyond Poynton, the dowager cottage, and a few undifferentiated London streets and furnished rooms. The action, such as it is, takes place on the tensed communicatory wires that make a triangle of Mrs. Gereth, her adversarial son Owen, and their ambivalent go-between, Fleda Vetch (the ugliest Jamesian name I've encountered, though I hear there's a character named Fanny Assingham in The Ambassadors). While immersed in the really excruciating middle of the book, in the tortuous exchanges between the impassive, nearly-simpleminded Owen and the quietly turbid Fleda, I tried, as an experiment, to convince myself that James was proposing a starkly staged, stylishly minimal, Kafkaesque proto-modernist chamber novel. But reading it I just felt claustrophobic.
My other annoyance--the puritanical conception of character--lies with what James chose to grow from this germ of dinner party gossip:
...an odd matter as that a good lady in the north, always well looked on, was at daggers drawn with her only son, ever hitherto exemplary, over the ownership of the valuable furniture of a fine old house just accruing to the young man by this father's death...
That heard-of woman became the Mrs. Gereth of this novel. She is a poet of interiors, Poynton her poem:
There had been in the first place the exquisite old house itself, early Jacobean, supreme in every part: it was a provocation, an inspiration, a matchless canvas for the picture. Then there had been her husband’s sympathy and generosity, his knowledge and love, their perfect accord and beautiful life together, twenty-six years of planning and seeking, a long, sunny harvest of taste and curiosity. Lastly, she never denied, there had been her personal gift, the genius, the passion, the patience of the collector – a patience, an almost infernal cunning, that had enabled her to do it all with a limited command of money.
Poynton was the record of a life. It was written in great syllables of colour and form, the tongues of other countries and the hands of rare artists. It was all France and Italy, with their ages composed to rest. For England you looked out of old windows – it was England that was the wide embrace.
Mrs. Gereth is faced with eviction from this personal treasure house, this essential stage, because of her son's imminent marriage to a tasteless frump. Her confidant is Fleda Vetch. Fleda's humble and humane taste is a perfect foil for Mrs. Gereth's Olympian aestheticism. Unlike Mrs. Gereth, Fleda has access to the sentimental and associative reasons that explain how "by certain natures, hideous objects can be loved" (on a exploratory visit to the dowager cottage, Mrs. Gereth sees only ugliness; Fleda is deeply touched by the life of the previous tenant as revealed by the leftover decoration and belongings). Fleda is even able to see the loveliness in Owen Gereth, a guileless, slightly boorish dolt in his mother's eyes.
So yeah, sounds great. The first third of the novel read much like The Tragic Muse. That novel portrayed the practice of art "as a human complication and social stumbling block," and I thought The Spoils of Poynton might continue its dramatic analysis of the difficulties that arise in the lives of people who live and judge only by aesthetic values. Mrs. Gereth's deepest love and pride is her practice of a perishable and generally ignored art. The co-existence of imperious aesthetic judgment and the necessarily selfless emotions of motherhood, within a single woman, seemed a rich subject.
But James turns to the story to Fleda. Which is what he intended all along. Scrutinizing the preface for reasons why the novel so bugged me, I found James saying that, from the moment of conception, he intended Mrs. Gereth and her son to be mindless drivers of action, fools, "fools who minister, at a particular crisis, to the intensity of the free spirit engaged with them." The free spirit, the moral pivot, being Fleda. To some of his contemporary critics and immediately posthumous detractors, James was the caricature of the fussy arch-aesthete. But he is actually quite suspicious of aestheticism. Some of his facetious, shallow, mildly villainous aesthetes--Gabriel Nash in The Tragic Muse, Osmond in The Portrait of a Lady--exist to furnish a contrast and a provocation to the deeper natures of Nick Dormer and Isabel Archer. He wasn't ever going to take a Mrs. Gereth seriously; as he says in the preface, she was to be a "figure" rather than a character, "clever" rather than "intelligent."
In the preface James admits the slightly absurd presumption, the unrealism, of furnishing every situation with a morally admirable character, with a "free spirit," with a Fleda to act as the "ground of appeal" and perching-place of readerly sympathy. And this is what I mean by James's puritanism. Sure, Fleda is nicer than Mrs. Gereth, but she isn't more interesting. This is the same staid moralism that produced the strange tone of The Aspern Papers, in which the narrator is duplicitous and scheming, but James can't impersonate his duplicitous or scheming voice. James was so much less sophisticated than we like to think. He was grateful for admittance to the Flaubert cenacle, for the chance to overhear and participate in the shop-talk of Flaubert, Edmond de Goncourt, Daudet--but while he admired the artistry of their novels, he privately recoiled from the squalor of their plots and the pessimism of their tone. Writing the full story of Mrs. Gereth would have presented no moral difficulty to any of his continental contemporaries. And after the century of Leopold Bloom and Humbert Humbert, the moral requirement to insert and aggrandize a Fleda Vetch seems pretty ridiculous.
But my complaints mean nothing if Fleda worked as a character. But she doesn't. She was well-designed as a companion to Mrs. Gereth, even as the eyes through which we saw Mrs. Gereth...but the love story, the hand wringing agonies and renunciations with Owen are just weak. The Notebooks show that The Spoils of Poynton was conceived as a short story, a short story that over time distended to novel size. A shame. As a story concentrated on Mrs. Gereth, even one with the claustrophobic playwriting effect, this would have worked. Instead we get the bloated and obtrusive story of Fleda Vetch. What a miserable botch!
January 25, 2018
Last night I dreamt I went to Poynton...50 years earlier it was Thornfield Hall and 40 years later it was Manderley. Those stately homes of England -- up in flames.
In this fatiguing short novel (1897), the compulsive and highly neurotic protagonist by name of Fleda Vetch (James in a campy mood ?) navigates between a mother who wants to preserve her "spoils" or treasures, collected over the years, for herself and a son who wants them for his soon-to-be-bride. In fact, his fiancée says the assorted knick-knacks must come with the marriage, or she won't be his. No one, including the author, questions her coveteous demands. Confidante Fleda merely coughs.
Fleda is a thumping bore as well as a Puritan who keeps harping on Honor and Pride and Virtue and Rectitude (in six delicious flavors). The son is repeatedly described as hollow, dull and lacking in taste. We only know this because James repeats and repeats the words; the fiancée is repeatedly described as vulgar, pretentious and a philistine. James again repeats but fails to illustrate. These 2 characters are not even pencil sketches. James, in his nosey Old Lady mood, does better with Old Mum.
So, there's constant blather about Negotiations : will the furniture and china stay or go ? Also, is Fleda in love with the pussy-whipped (by Mum and fiancée) son and will he marry or not. Everything is a goddamned dilemma. None of it is believable. James couldn't release any passion, it seems, until a few years later (1899) when he went Mad About the Boy, American sculptor Hendrik Andersen, and he was into his late 50s. Then he wrote "The Ambassadors," a novel that preached : "Live all you can."
He intended this as a short story, but after one of his plays failed and he was booed offstage by the gallery - a wounding event - with Bernard Shaw and H G Wells among the first-nighters, he couldn't pull his pen from the inkpot. It should have remained a short story. Trivia: the theatre management followed his disaster with Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest."
In this fatiguing short novel (1897), the compulsive and highly neurotic protagonist by name of Fleda Vetch (James in a campy mood ?) navigates between a mother who wants to preserve her "spoils" or treasures, collected over the years, for herself and a son who wants them for his soon-to-be-bride. In fact, his fiancée says the assorted knick-knacks must come with the marriage, or she won't be his. No one, including the author, questions her coveteous demands. Confidante Fleda merely coughs.
Fleda is a thumping bore as well as a Puritan who keeps harping on Honor and Pride and Virtue and Rectitude (in six delicious flavors). The son is repeatedly described as hollow, dull and lacking in taste. We only know this because James repeats and repeats the words; the fiancée is repeatedly described as vulgar, pretentious and a philistine. James again repeats but fails to illustrate. These 2 characters are not even pencil sketches. James, in his nosey Old Lady mood, does better with Old Mum.
So, there's constant blather about Negotiations : will the furniture and china stay or go ? Also, is Fleda in love with the pussy-whipped (by Mum and fiancée) son and will he marry or not. Everything is a goddamned dilemma. None of it is believable. James couldn't release any passion, it seems, until a few years later (1899) when he went Mad About the Boy, American sculptor Hendrik Andersen, and he was into his late 50s. Then he wrote "The Ambassadors," a novel that preached : "Live all you can."
He intended this as a short story, but after one of his plays failed and he was booed offstage by the gallery - a wounding event - with Bernard Shaw and H G Wells among the first-nighters, he couldn't pull his pen from the inkpot. It should have remained a short story. Trivia: the theatre management followed his disaster with Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest."
July 8, 2021
4.5/5
March 16, 2012
This book probably represents James at his most annoying. Looking at it generously, there are 5 characters (though I think one of them does not actually make an appearance). Their world is cramped and claustrophobic. Their concerns, for the most part, seem to be petty. This is debatable, because everything with James at this point in his writing, seems to be pointing elsewhere - to something ineffable. The only problem is that things wouldn't seem so profound, mysterious, and ineffable, if only someone would just come out and say what they meant. For James, that becomes more and more difficult with his characters. They stubbornly, and endlessly, talk about the matter that concerns them most. But for the most part, they are so concerned with niceties and appearances that they never once come to the point. And this refusal to say what they mean leads to bad consequences for just about everyone involved. I won't say it leads to tragedy, because here I didn't think any of the characters merited a tragic end. They were all fairly base to begin with, I didn't feel bad when they got taken down.
The plot, like most of later James, is very simple. It could easily have been molded into a wonderful 20-30 page short story. Add the false starts, the hesitations, the circling back on things that were sort of decided but not really, and it balloons into a much bigger work. And I realize that all this sounds like I didn't like the book. But I did. I enjoy later James, even though I sometimes find it almost endlessly frustrating. I did not like this book as much as either The Wings of the Dove or The Golden Bowl. Here, it feels like he has just found a new approach to his writing and it doesn't sit all that well with the material he's presenting.
There was a philosopher at Cambridge in the early 1900s named G.E. Moore. He was vastly admired by the members of the Bloomsbury circle. They all thought him extremely profound. This, despite the fact that he rarely talked at any of their parties. The members of the circle took his reticence for deep thinking. But when someone asked him about this, he replied, "Perhaps its because I have nothing to say." I sometimes feel that way about the characters in these James books. They talk and talk at a subject or around a subject, but in the end I'm left wondering whether any of them have anything to say at all. All of their fine distinctions seem to be backed up by an engulfing emptiness. But unlike Moore, they don't stay quiet. Sometimes I'm glad that they don't. In this book, I wasn't quite so sure.
The plot, like most of later James, is very simple. It could easily have been molded into a wonderful 20-30 page short story. Add the false starts, the hesitations, the circling back on things that were sort of decided but not really, and it balloons into a much bigger work. And I realize that all this sounds like I didn't like the book. But I did. I enjoy later James, even though I sometimes find it almost endlessly frustrating. I did not like this book as much as either The Wings of the Dove or The Golden Bowl. Here, it feels like he has just found a new approach to his writing and it doesn't sit all that well with the material he's presenting.
There was a philosopher at Cambridge in the early 1900s named G.E. Moore. He was vastly admired by the members of the Bloomsbury circle. They all thought him extremely profound. This, despite the fact that he rarely talked at any of their parties. The members of the circle took his reticence for deep thinking. But when someone asked him about this, he replied, "Perhaps its because I have nothing to say." I sometimes feel that way about the characters in these James books. They talk and talk at a subject or around a subject, but in the end I'm left wondering whether any of them have anything to say at all. All of their fine distinctions seem to be backed up by an engulfing emptiness. But unlike Moore, they don't stay quiet. Sometimes I'm glad that they don't. In this book, I wasn't quite so sure.
May 31, 2020
Senryu Review:
Gewgaw-obsessed mom
schemes to keep spoils with sweet pal
from cretinous son
Gewgaw-obsessed mom
schemes to keep spoils with sweet pal
from cretinous son
April 3, 2022
This was a great listen (I've decided Henry James is too detailed for me to read but incredible to listen to)
Basically a horrid group of people fight over the treasured contents of a country house! But whilst they're horrid, they really are interesting.
Basically a horrid group of people fight over the treasured contents of a country house! But whilst they're horrid, they really are interesting.
February 3, 2024
Öncelikle belirtmeliyim ki; kitabın yazar tarafından yazılmış önsözü eşsiz bir mücevher. Sadece bu kısım için bile okunmalı.
Konunun basitliği; anlatımın ve kurgunun etkileyiciliğini, ve karakterlerin güçlü yapısını daha da görünür kılıyor. Henry James bu romanında da duyguların, ilişkiler üzerindeki etkisini enfes bir şekilde işlemiş.
Mutlaka okunması gereken bir Henry James romanı.
Çok beğendim.
Konunun basitliği; anlatımın ve kurgunun etkileyiciliğini, ve karakterlerin güçlü yapısını daha da görünür kılıyor. Henry James bu romanında da duyguların, ilişkiler üzerindeki etkisini enfes bir şekilde işlemiş.
Mutlaka okunması gereken bir Henry James romanı.
Çok beğendim.
June 28, 2017
The Spoils of Poynton by Henry James is the story of a widowed woman name Mrs. Gereth who must give up her property to her son because the property is to be transferred to the son and his wife upon his marriage. Gereth is from Old Money, and she has meticulously collected all the fine pieces in her home, and so she does not want to part with them. Matters are complicated from the beginning when a woman, who is not wealthy, named Fleda becomes Mrs. Gereth's ally in her fight to preserve those antique pieces. The novel becomes a battle between the Old Money of Mrs. Gereth and the New Money of her son and wife. I've never seen a more compelling novel written about the desire to keep 'old things,' as James called them. That a novel can stay remain so focused on one object, the acquisition of furniture, and still be compelling is a testament to James's writing, and how writing about an object, if done well, can reveal great insights into people and the human condition, as well as the societies in which these people belong. This is a fantastic book.
March 14, 2012
I'm working on a theory that Fleda resists marriage to Owen because she doesn't want to end up another item in Mrs. Gereth's collection. Despite the fact that Fleda always comes when called, she certainly values her independence enough to make this plausible.
I don't know. I have trouble with Henry James. I'm going to start reading one of his novels a year just to prove he's not the boss of me.
I don't know. I have trouble with Henry James. I'm going to start reading one of his novels a year just to prove he's not the boss of me.
October 11, 2025
i have decided that this is henry james' idea of a practical joke.
May 26, 2025
Das war nicht gerade ein Lesevergnügen. Aber vielleicht eben drum viel Anregung für die grauen Zellen in diesem Kammerspiel um ein Haus voller seltenster Einrichtungsgegenstände (die titelgebenden Kostbarkeiten). Vielleicht - und das ist eher meine Vermutung - war's auch alles eher Krempel und Henry James zieht den Leser bloß 300 Seiten lang auf :)
October 11, 2007
Even though the story isn't all that great, James uses lots of words in ways that make the book difficult to read. I'm not exaggerating. I've seem concrete examples that show how his revisions of sentences deliberately push the verb farther back and add pronouns that don't have an immediately identifiable object. If you can get beyond that, or enjoy it as some people seem to, maybe perversely, there's a finely knitted yarn in there. Widowed Mrs. Gareth must vacate her home, Poynton, filled with the treasures she's collected her whole life, and hand it over to her inheriting son Owen and his fiance Mona, both philistines who don't appreciate fine things. Mrs. Gareth's only hope is in Fleda, intelligent and trained in the arts, to attract Owen and influence him to drop the engagement to Mona, who isn't particularly nice anways. Of course dropping engagements was much more scandalous then. Overall? Impressively dense, rewarding to study, but not something you'd want to read.
February 11, 2022
Fionnuala has written the perfect review of this Henry James’ short (thankfully!)novel here on GOODREADS!!
I couldn’t seem to like any of the characters. I’m not sure if James wanted us to care about the feelings of “poor Fleda Vetch” or not. I kept feeling like she was acting like a doormat and for no good reason, even for that time period. These people weren’t even family or old and dear friends! It did get better or easier to read but, this book was the opposite of motivational 😂
I couldn’t seem to like any of the characters. I’m not sure if James wanted us to care about the feelings of “poor Fleda Vetch” or not. I kept feeling like she was acting like a doormat and for no good reason, even for that time period. These people weren’t even family or old and dear friends! It did get better or easier to read but, this book was the opposite of motivational 😂
November 18, 2019
One of the three Henry James that I'd recommend to almost anyone, this is a vile little treat of callousness and obsession with as nastily hilarious an ending as you could wish for. I'm not certain how seriously we are to take the narrative voice's assurances that the titular 'spoils' are treasures of the highest quality or if, rather, Mrs Gereth is supposed to come over as a hoarder of expensive French tat. Neither am I sure that it matters. The point is that SHE thinks they're treasures and behaves as one would behave if so monomaniacally convinced of their status as such. It's not stressed but she is clearly something of an Anglophobe - England is something to be kept outside the window; within Poynton's hallowed portals, all must be Continental. The attitude we find today, perhaps, in the less benevolent sort of Guardian reader.
True, the book's not perfect. Son Owen Gereth is a crashing bore and his worshipper, Fleda, companion to Mrs G, is a truly unpleasant study in ruthless masochism. But, whatever protestations narrative voice and Fleda make to the contrary, I'm not sure we aren't supposed to see them as such.
A perverse pleasure for those who relish portrayals of a certain kind of mental ill-health. Do read it.
True, the book's not perfect. Son Owen Gereth is a crashing bore and his worshipper, Fleda, companion to Mrs G, is a truly unpleasant study in ruthless masochism. But, whatever protestations narrative voice and Fleda make to the contrary, I'm not sure we aren't supposed to see them as such.
A perverse pleasure for those who relish portrayals of a certain kind of mental ill-health. Do read it.
May 22, 2025
I seem to remember reading somewhere the quip "Henry James was a woman." Maybe it was about someone else, but this book could only be written by a woman. I happen to be a part of the small, or maybe large? tribe who cherish beautiful objects, their arrangements, their atmosphere, their quiet song. This is the main character of the book. The human characters are the vestals. Only Edith Wharton and Proust could write so truly about a house, an eclectic art collection and the souls enmeshed within. With this unexpected book, Henry James has risen in my esteem and in my heart.
Yes, he is occasionally obscure, yes, he is occasionally belaboring some points, but the end is worth the occasional wince. It is just magnificent.
There was something about these two brothers, he and William James, the psychologist.
Yes, he is occasionally obscure, yes, he is occasionally belaboring some points, but the end is worth the occasional wince. It is just magnificent.
There was something about these two brothers, he and William James, the psychologist.
September 8, 2023
Henry James really said “men are dumb and NOT to be trusted”
November 8, 2017
Die Kostbarkeiten von Poynton, eines der Spätwerke von Henry James, wurde im Manesse Verlag in neuer Übersetzung von Nikolaus Stingl herausgegeben und hat darüber hinaus eine wunderschöne Gestaltung mit farbigem Buchschnitt und Leineneinband erhalten, die allein schon zum Sammeln seiner Werke wunderbar ist. Doch auch der Name Nikolaus Stingl trägt eine Art Gütesiegel unter den deutschen Übersetzern, weshalb ich mich auf eine gute Übersetzung und eine tolle Geschichte von Henry James freute.
Ich bin ein großer Fan von Henry James, habe jedoch bisher tatsächlich nur zu seinen frühen Werken gegriffen. Somit war Poynton mein erstes Spätwerk des Autors und ich erkannte schnell, dass es einen ganz anderen Charme hat. Ich bleibe nach wie vor ein Fan der früheren Werke doch was in seinen älteren Büchern ebenso heraussticht, das ist die große Gabe, Gesellschaften und einzelne Personen genauestens zu analysieren und ihre Schwächen auf teilweise sehr satirische aber auch versteckte Art dazustellen. Nichts anderes war auch hier der Fall und man kann einfach nicht anders, als die Passagen nach Hinweisen abzusuchen, das Verhalten der Charaktere zu analysieren und sich darüber zu amüsieren.
Besonders spannend fand ich hierbei Fleda. Die wird schnell zu einem Werkzeug von Mrs Gereth, als diese erkennt, dass sie die Schönheit Poyntons genauso schätzt, wie sie selbst: Das Problem ist nämlich, dass ihr Sohn eine Frau heiraten möchte, die die Kostbarkeiten nicht zu schätzen weiß und an die Mrs Gereth diese keinesfalls verlieren möchte. Sie sieht in Fleda somit nicht nur eine potentielle Schwiegertochter sondern auch eine Lösung des Gesamtkonflikts und auch Fleda findet nach und nach Gefallen an Mrs Gereths Sohn Owen. Dennoch versucht Fleda immer wieder, nicht zum Spielball der Witwe zu werden und lehnt sic in ihrem Verhalten häufiger gegen diese auf, was ihr jedoch nicht immer gelingt. Besonders spannend war es auch, ihre Entwicklung nachzuverfolgen und gegen Ende nimmt dieser Punkt immer mehr an Spannung zu.
Gemeinsam mit Mrs Gereth und Owen hängt Fleda in einer Art Kommunikationsdreieck und der Großteil des Buches spielt sich auch in Gesprächen dieser drei Parteien ab. Wir haben also einen interessanten Familienkonflikt, der mich sehr fesseln konnte und darüber hinaus sowohl im Konflikt selbst als auch in seiner Lösung sehr unüblich ist. Darüber hinaus fand ich viele Wendungen, die ich erstaunt las, da ich sie so nicht erwartet habe und das Ende des Romans setzt dem ganzen noch eine Krone auf und führt dazu, dass der Leser noch einige Zeit an die Geschichte zurückdenkt.
Fazit: Henry James Spätwerk Die Kostbarkeiten von Poynton unterscheidet sich zwar von seinen früheren Werken, die Kunst, Personen und Gesellschaften zu analysieren, ist jedoch erhalten geblieben. Er entführt den Leser in eine Geschichte, mit einem sehr eigenartigen Familienkonflikt und schafft es, mit seiner Charakteranalyse zu fesseln. Besonders hervorgehoben werden, muss außerdem die gute Übersetzung.
Ich bin ein großer Fan von Henry James, habe jedoch bisher tatsächlich nur zu seinen frühen Werken gegriffen. Somit war Poynton mein erstes Spätwerk des Autors und ich erkannte schnell, dass es einen ganz anderen Charme hat. Ich bleibe nach wie vor ein Fan der früheren Werke doch was in seinen älteren Büchern ebenso heraussticht, das ist die große Gabe, Gesellschaften und einzelne Personen genauestens zu analysieren und ihre Schwächen auf teilweise sehr satirische aber auch versteckte Art dazustellen. Nichts anderes war auch hier der Fall und man kann einfach nicht anders, als die Passagen nach Hinweisen abzusuchen, das Verhalten der Charaktere zu analysieren und sich darüber zu amüsieren.
Besonders spannend fand ich hierbei Fleda. Die wird schnell zu einem Werkzeug von Mrs Gereth, als diese erkennt, dass sie die Schönheit Poyntons genauso schätzt, wie sie selbst: Das Problem ist nämlich, dass ihr Sohn eine Frau heiraten möchte, die die Kostbarkeiten nicht zu schätzen weiß und an die Mrs Gereth diese keinesfalls verlieren möchte. Sie sieht in Fleda somit nicht nur eine potentielle Schwiegertochter sondern auch eine Lösung des Gesamtkonflikts und auch Fleda findet nach und nach Gefallen an Mrs Gereths Sohn Owen. Dennoch versucht Fleda immer wieder, nicht zum Spielball der Witwe zu werden und lehnt sic in ihrem Verhalten häufiger gegen diese auf, was ihr jedoch nicht immer gelingt. Besonders spannend war es auch, ihre Entwicklung nachzuverfolgen und gegen Ende nimmt dieser Punkt immer mehr an Spannung zu.
Gemeinsam mit Mrs Gereth und Owen hängt Fleda in einer Art Kommunikationsdreieck und der Großteil des Buches spielt sich auch in Gesprächen dieser drei Parteien ab. Wir haben also einen interessanten Familienkonflikt, der mich sehr fesseln konnte und darüber hinaus sowohl im Konflikt selbst als auch in seiner Lösung sehr unüblich ist. Darüber hinaus fand ich viele Wendungen, die ich erstaunt las, da ich sie so nicht erwartet habe und das Ende des Romans setzt dem ganzen noch eine Krone auf und führt dazu, dass der Leser noch einige Zeit an die Geschichte zurückdenkt.
Fazit: Henry James Spätwerk Die Kostbarkeiten von Poynton unterscheidet sich zwar von seinen früheren Werken, die Kunst, Personen und Gesellschaften zu analysieren, ist jedoch erhalten geblieben. Er entführt den Leser in eine Geschichte, mit einem sehr eigenartigen Familienkonflikt und schafft es, mit seiner Charakteranalyse zu fesseln. Besonders hervorgehoben werden, muss außerdem die gute Übersetzung.
August 1, 2021
3/5 stars to my second ever Henry James book. When Owen Gereth asks his widowed mother to move out of their home as he prepares to marry, Mrs Gereth asks for the help of a young friend named Fleda Vetch in order to save not only her son, but also the objects of the house - the very spoils of Poynton.
This one was a bit confusing to read. Caught between intrigue and not understanding the choices the characters made, I found myself frustrated more often than not. Still, the way James built it up, with the complicated family relations, had me staying. In fact I did feel a bit like Fleda: not really a part of it but still caught in the middle and unable to remove myself.
Fleda was an interesting character to read from, but the entire cast all share a chronic inability to say what they mean. In retrospect not much does happen in this one, but James paints it in such a way that it seems a great adventure for 200 ish pages. In a way he did the story justice by having Fleda as the narrator, because for a big part of the book she is simply there while other people make decisions for her and around her. My frustration started once Fleda's own mind and emotions played a bigger part of the story, but that is simply because I couldn't always understand the choices and why certain things had to go unsaid.
The ending made me see Fleda in a bit of a different light, and it's fascinating to think about why she did what she did and reacted as she did. I feel as if Henry James is a bit of an early Hemingway in the way that all actions have layers upon layers of hidden meaning, and I'm looking forward to reading more by him despite this not being a new favorite.
This one was a bit confusing to read. Caught between intrigue and not understanding the choices the characters made, I found myself frustrated more often than not. Still, the way James built it up, with the complicated family relations, had me staying. In fact I did feel a bit like Fleda: not really a part of it but still caught in the middle and unable to remove myself.
Fleda was an interesting character to read from, but the entire cast all share a chronic inability to say what they mean. In retrospect not much does happen in this one, but James paints it in such a way that it seems a great adventure for 200 ish pages. In a way he did the story justice by having Fleda as the narrator, because for a big part of the book she is simply there while other people make decisions for her and around her. My frustration started once Fleda's own mind and emotions played a bigger part of the story, but that is simply because I couldn't always understand the choices and why certain things had to go unsaid.
The ending made me see Fleda in a bit of a different light, and it's fascinating to think about why she did what she did and reacted as she did. I feel as if Henry James is a bit of an early Hemingway in the way that all actions have layers upon layers of hidden meaning, and I'm looking forward to reading more by him despite this not being a new favorite.
November 20, 2024
An excellent book about the obsession over material things that leads to an overspill into the personal life. It feels a little like a twist on Washington Square with the protagonist having to deal with an overprotective mother and a girl he desires, but this time the obstacle is literally material possessions. A quick read and another masterpiece by James.
November 8, 2023
I really did not enjoy it at the start but it grew on me very much as the plot progresses— it felt like a much tighter and even more psychology Portrait of a Lady. Worth it for how it picks up at the middle and end.
Read
April 3, 2018Provisional review and rating: 3.5
So who's manipulating who? Will bear fruit in close analysis – but I don't really ha' the energy for that...
So who's manipulating who? Will bear fruit in close analysis – but I don't really ha' the energy for that...
November 10, 2020
Θεωρούσα ότι ο λόγος που όλα εννοούνται και τίποτα δεν είναι ξεκάθαρο στο Στρίψιμο της Βίδας, ήταν πως ήθελε να είναι επίτηδες ασαφής για να το κάνει πιο ατμοσφαιρικό. Με είχε κουράσει αυτό αλλά ήθελα να δώσω στο συγγραφέα μια ακόμα ευκαιρία. Κατάφερε να κάνει ένα βιβλίο χωρίς ίχνος μεταφυσικού να μοιάζει μυστήριο και τα νοήματα να κρύβονται πίσω από μη ειπωμένα λόγια. Με κούρασε τρομερά. Η δε εξέλιξη του έργου και οι ήρωες ήταν άκρως εκνευριστικοί: μια κακή πεθερά, μια μέλλουσα νύφη που προτιμά να χάσει τον αρραβωνιαστικό της απ'το να χάσει το σπίτι με τα εντυπωσιακά έργα τέχνης που η πεθερά της είχε με τα χρόνια συλλέξει(παρότι δεν την ενδιέφεραν καθόλου, μονάχα από πείσμα), και μια προστατευόμενη της μητέρας, που ήθελε το γιο και δε το έλεγε και ακόμα κι όταν το κατάλαβε ο έρμος, τον έδιωχνε ξανά και ξανά χαμένη στις παράξενες ηθικές της. Ο μόνος που ήταν εξαρχής καλό στοιχείο ήταν ο γιος!
Αντιλαμβάνομαι ότι η εποχή είναι τέτοια που σηκώνει δραματικές καταστάσεις και εσωτερικές συγκρούσεις λόγω καθωσπρεπισμού, όπως τα βιβλία της Μπροντέ ή της Ώστεν, αλλά το παράκανε! Ηταν που ήταν όλο το βιβλίο ενα διαρκές "θέλω αλλά δε θέλω να το ξέρει κανείς και θέλω να βασανίζομαι μόνη μου σαν οσιομάρτυρας και τι θα πει ο κόσμος και δεν είναι σωστό", δεν είχε καν την αξιοπρέπεια να δώσει ένα καλό τέλος!
Δεν είναι καθόλου στο στυλ μου αυτός ο συγγραφέας, πρέπει να το πάρω απόφαση. Κρύβεται υπερβολικά πολύ στις λεπτομέρειες και ο τρόπος που γράφει είναι τέτοιος που δε θα πίστευα με τίποτα ότι είναι αντρική πένα. Γράφει γυναικεία με έναν κακό τρόπο, υπονοεί πράγματα, δεν ξεκαθαρίζει ποτέ το τοπίο. Ίσως να ήταν ξαναλέω η εποχή έτσι, που οι γυναίκες σκέφτονταν και ενεργούσαν με τέτοιο τρόπο, αλλά είναι τρομερά ξένος σε μένα αυτός ο τρόπος σκέψης. Δυστυχώς, δεν.
Αντιλαμβάνομαι ότι η εποχή είναι τέτοια που σηκώνει δραματικές καταστάσεις και εσωτερικές συγκρούσεις λόγω καθωσπρεπισμού, όπως τα βιβλία της Μπροντέ ή της Ώστεν, αλλά το παράκανε! Ηταν που ήταν όλο το βιβλίο ενα διαρκές "θέλω αλλά δε θέλω να το ξέρει κανείς και θέλω να βασανίζομαι μόνη μου σαν οσιομάρτυρας και τι θα πει ο κόσμος και δεν είναι σωστό", δεν είχε καν την αξιοπρέπεια να δώσει ένα καλό τέλος!
Δεν είναι καθόλου στο στυλ μου αυτός ο συγγραφέας, πρέπει να το πάρω απόφαση. Κρύβεται υπερβολικά πολύ στις λεπτομέρειες και ο τρόπος που γράφει είναι τέτοιος που δε θα πίστευα με τίποτα ότι είναι αντρική πένα. Γράφει γυναικεία με έναν κακό τρόπο, υπονοεί πράγματα, δεν ξεκαθαρίζει ποτέ το τοπίο. Ίσως να ήταν ξαναλέω η εποχή έτσι, που οι γυναίκες σκέφτονταν και ενεργούσαν με τέτοιο τρόπο, αλλά είναι τρομερά ξένος σε μένα αυτός ο τρόπος σκέψης. Δυστυχώς, δεν.
August 27, 2022
A study of how possessions poison relationships, with James’ usual themes of manipulation and morality.
May 4, 2012
There are no spoilers for The Spoils of Poynton in these comments, but there are spoilers for The Ambassadors and The Portrait of A Lady.
I have great respect and admiration for Henry James, but this is not one of his best efforts. A pretty good novel, but not one of his best efforts.
The plot is set in motion by the following events: a mother and father have spent their lives collecting beautiful objects, which are housed in their dwelling at Poynton. They have a son who is a kind of jolly, well-meaning English upper class bloke, insensitive to the beauty of the objects. The father dies and, under English law, the son inherits everything. The son falls in love with a girl very much like himself. His mother fervently wants control of the objects and befriends another girl, our heroine, with the sensitivities the mother would like to see in a daughter-in-law who would cherish the objects.
The events and emotional entanglements that follow are quite tense. This book has a more active plot, more twisting, and turning, than you usually associate with Henry James. There is something closer to a physical love scene than I can recall in any other of his novels.
The ending is a bit of a deus ex machina.
Only the mother and our heroine, whose name is Fleda Vetch, are fully characterized. Henry James lavishes all his powers of witty, incisive, allusive, and complicated character description on these two. The other characters are cursory. The mother is energetic, aggressive, self-centered, and rather likable for her down-to-earth focus. Fleda is one of those self-defeating morally punctilious James protagonists, who snatches self-justification from the jaws of satisfaction time and again.
The prose is James' elaborate middle style, fun to follow but not easy, building up characters and situations with a million smart observations, but he is too fond of calling characters "magnificent" or 'luminous'.
I say I'm fond of Henry James, but I find myself angry with him when his protagonists damn themselves to mediocrity at the moment a rich life is within their grasp over what seems to me ridiculous moral compunctions. Lambert Strether in The Ambassadors could perfectly well settle down with Maria Gostrey in Paris to a rich and meaningful life if he didn't have a painful horror of having profited from others' mistakes. Isabel Archer in Portrait of a Lady could divorce her husband and have a passionate marriage with Casper Goodwood, if she would drop the obligation to suffer for her own mistakes. It is a measure of James greatness that I care enough about these people to be really angry with him.
Most of the characters of this sort in James are scrupulously honest; Fleda is a variation. She lies all the time. She is chronically dishonest with the other characters and with herself, but for the highest of motives, or at any rate the most self-defeating.
James aficionados will know that he is fond of dimly significant names. His notebooks are replete with several lists of such names and musings on what a person with such and such a name would be like. I understand about “Fleda” – she flees, literally running away from an admirer at one point, as does Isabel Archer. But “vetch" is an agricultural product like alfalfa that is fed to cattle and sheep. Fleda is a pert little thing, not in the least bovine or ovine.
I have great respect and admiration for Henry James, but this is not one of his best efforts. A pretty good novel, but not one of his best efforts.
The plot is set in motion by the following events: a mother and father have spent their lives collecting beautiful objects, which are housed in their dwelling at Poynton. They have a son who is a kind of jolly, well-meaning English upper class bloke, insensitive to the beauty of the objects. The father dies and, under English law, the son inherits everything. The son falls in love with a girl very much like himself. His mother fervently wants control of the objects and befriends another girl, our heroine, with the sensitivities the mother would like to see in a daughter-in-law who would cherish the objects.
The events and emotional entanglements that follow are quite tense. This book has a more active plot, more twisting, and turning, than you usually associate with Henry James. There is something closer to a physical love scene than I can recall in any other of his novels.
The ending is a bit of a deus ex machina.
Only the mother and our heroine, whose name is Fleda Vetch, are fully characterized. Henry James lavishes all his powers of witty, incisive, allusive, and complicated character description on these two. The other characters are cursory. The mother is energetic, aggressive, self-centered, and rather likable for her down-to-earth focus. Fleda is one of those self-defeating morally punctilious James protagonists, who snatches self-justification from the jaws of satisfaction time and again.
The prose is James' elaborate middle style, fun to follow but not easy, building up characters and situations with a million smart observations, but he is too fond of calling characters "magnificent" or 'luminous'.
I say I'm fond of Henry James, but I find myself angry with him when his protagonists damn themselves to mediocrity at the moment a rich life is within their grasp over what seems to me ridiculous moral compunctions. Lambert Strether in The Ambassadors could perfectly well settle down with Maria Gostrey in Paris to a rich and meaningful life if he didn't have a painful horror of having profited from others' mistakes. Isabel Archer in Portrait of a Lady could divorce her husband and have a passionate marriage with Casper Goodwood, if she would drop the obligation to suffer for her own mistakes. It is a measure of James greatness that I care enough about these people to be really angry with him.
Most of the characters of this sort in James are scrupulously honest; Fleda is a variation. She lies all the time. She is chronically dishonest with the other characters and with herself, but for the highest of motives, or at any rate the most self-defeating.
James aficionados will know that he is fond of dimly significant names. His notebooks are replete with several lists of such names and musings on what a person with such and such a name would be like. I understand about “Fleda” – she flees, literally running away from an admirer at one point, as does Isabel Archer. But “vetch" is an agricultural product like alfalfa that is fed to cattle and sheep. Fleda is a pert little thing, not in the least bovine or ovine.
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