vi, 462 leaves ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of English, 1977

The purpose of this thesis is to study Henry James's use of art objects and art imagery in the delineation of character. I have first endeavoured to briefly outline the basic concepts of art which James embraced and applied in his tales and novels, and have traced, in his literary and art criticism, his developing views of the "real," the "romantic," and the "ideal." James's change in attitude toward the "real" and the "romantic" has been noted in his own work published between 1876 and 1894, and the principal techniques of the painter which he employs have been set forth. In an analysis of three tales: "The Madonna of the Future," "The Liar," and "The Real Thing" I have attempted to illustrate James's view of the nature and function of art and the artist and the problems involved in achieving a satisfactory balance between the real and the ideal. The conclusions reached have been applied to two of James's major novels of his later phase: The Wings of the Dove and The Golden Bowl in an attempt to demonstrate that, using the objet d'art and art imagery (as in the stories examined), James achieves reality of characterization and the complete realization of the ideal in the real. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

An analysis of the psychological and philosophical dimensions of two central symbols of Henry James's later work, the Maltese cross of The Spoils of Poynton (1897) and the golden bowl of The Golden Bowl (1904), reveals that by 1903 James had assimilated from the late nineteenth century Zeitgeist the essential features of Darwinism, psychic determinism, fin de siècle romanticism, Bergson's élan vital, Henry Adams' equation of spiritual with physical energy or force, and William James's pragmatism. The complex symbolism of the Maltese cross and the golden bowl mainly expresses the destructive potential of romantic idealism and ethical absolutism; hence I conclude that James unconsciously shared Ibsen's attitude toward ideals and idealism, as interpreted by Shaw in The Quintessence of Ibsenism (1891). Two visions of man underlie these novels: (1) the Darwinism-inspired view of man as a being whose animal nature must be sternly repressed by that conscience T. H. Huxley termed "the watchman of society" before either psychic evolution or amelioration of man's general condition could be achieved; (2) the ancient doctrine of man as microcosm and the ethical goal of psychic harmony from which the animal nature is not excluded. The former is ultimately rejected in favor of the latter, as James dramatizes the problem of the ethically sensitive person who is involved in a struggle to fulfil his life-potential. In The Spoils of Poynton, in his presentation of Fleda Vetch, James implicitly rejects renunciation of life for the sake of honor as a valid mode of conduct. In The Golden Bowl, in his presentation of Maggie Verver, he in effect offers a solution to the problem of how the individual should react to evil. James's treatment of the problem of self-fulfilment in these two novels implies his gradual, and to a large extent unconscious, conversion to an ethical pragmatism similar to that advocated by William James. The totally destructive practice of self-sacrifice on the part of the heroine of the first novel gives way in the second novel to a partial self-sacrifice that is not only compatible with self-fulfilment but necessary for psychic development. As static ideals are found to inhibit psychic evolution, the corresponding philosophical change is an implicit reorientation from belief in the validity of immutable ideals to a final intuition that ultimate reality lies in the dynamic archetypes of psychic life. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

James's profound pessimism about the lives of the vast majority of the characters whom he chooses to portray in his fiction has been somewhat under emphasized by the critics. James considers a life successful only when the individual in question realizes his inner potential and thus achieves a sense of self-fulfilment. Yet the reader's cumulative impression of James's fiction is that his characters almost invariably fail to achieve this desirable state, and that they are doomed to disappointment and heartache. This unhappiness almost invariably arises from the relation between the sexes. James considers several major categories of people, but all but one group, the artists, fall short of the objective. For example, James's young female characters (whether European, English, or American), are under constant pressure to "marry well"—to seize the nearest man and the largest fortune. Yet James portrays marriage as the most inhumane of institutions; as one in which women immure themselves and sacrifice all their individuality. Similarly, James's male characters are never happy or fulfilled either in marriage or in business, for in marriage they tend to be brutal or insensitive, while in business they subjugate their moral and aesthetic senses to acquisitive ones. Such debased values are detrimental to the man himself and to all those with whom he lives. Nor are the rare sensitive men in James's fiction successful in life, for they tend to base their own happiness on the actions of other people—a precarious foundation. James believes only one sort of happiness is worthwhile and lasting, and that possession of it constitutes success in life. Only the artist can achieve this perfect happiness but he can enjoy it only on the most difficult terms: he must commit himself absolutely to his art. The artist must be a man or woman unlike others, sacrificing all earthly vanities to his one ideal vision. He cannot permit himself to be overwhelmed by the ordinary concerns of daily life. He must remove himself as much as possible from the world of getting and spending, loving and marrying. Only by making this absolute commitment can he achieve the happiness which consists of knowing that he has done the best work that is in him. This sense of consummate achievement constitutes happiness for James's artist characters. They consider it worth the price they pay. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

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The purpose of this thesis is to provide a general introduction to the study of James' art criticism, to establish his aesthetic criteria and to indicate the relationship between his theory of art and the themes of his fiction. First, I have included an analysis of three stories concerning the artist and his craft: "The Madonna of the Future," "The Liar," and "The Real Thing." Drawing certain conclusions as to James’ view of the nature of art and the nature and function of the artist, I have then proceeded to examine his most important statements on nineteenth century painting. Although this is only a small portion of his many comments on not only the art of painting but all the Fine Arts, I have limited my discussion to painting for the sake of brevity and clarity, and to the nineteenth century because James is a nineteenth century novelist. I have attempted to show his amazing perception of the various aesthetic movements of his time and his sympathetic attitude towards the many pitfalls into which the artists of the nineteenth century fell. I have also tried to indicate briefly where James differed from the major art critics of the time, such as Ruskin, Pater and Baudelaire. I feel that certain conclusions can be drawn from a study of James' art criticism: one, that it is important to any serious study of his novels; two, that it is closely linked to certain twentieth century attitudes towards the nature of art; and three, that the aesthetic theory out of which James is working has a direct relation to both the form and content of his novels. His characters are acting out his own struggle for a compromise between the Real and the Ideal, and his theory of art and theory of life being one and the same, he feels that one should, in a certain sense, make of one's life a work of art. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

This thesis examines the structures guiding and informing reading intrinsic to James's "late" style. It seeks to explore James's analogy between reading as an ethical activity and his own and his characters' acts of storytelling. It looks first at the necessities of reading as they are presented through the character of Isabel Archer in The Portrait of a Lady, to find that reading for James is itself a form of storytelling. James's concept of "revision," which replaces the concept of "re-writing," unites the activities of reading and storytelling because both activities, to be free, must be guided by the contingencies of experience. James's emphasis on the determinations of experience, which yields changing apprehensions of the same material, at once makes reading a test of the reader's resources in dealing with unexpected and complex situations, and storytelling an act of improvisation if it is to be faithful to the demands of its subject. The second half of the thesis examines Maggie Verver's command of storytelling in The Golden Bowl. It finds that ethical storytellers must have the same faith in their subject matter as ethical readers must have in the texts they engage. Finally, the thesis unites the study of reading with storytelling by examining the ways in which stories are exemplary performances whose the most significant subject is the audience. It is the forms of judgement that a work of art elicits which are essential to establishing alternative conceptions of the good and new modes of valuation in a community.

The thesis focuses on a variation of James's interest in the "international theme", the effect of transatlantic influences on the development of personality, culture and idea. In the context of this theme it seeks to understand the processes in the development of, and portrayal of change in, the identities of two central characters in the fiction of Henry James, Isabel Archer and Lambert Strether. The two novels analysed, The Portrait of a Lady and The Ambassadors. have a strong contextual relevance to the ''international theme", and compass the span of James's career, providing some degrees of comparison. Beginning with a view of the preliminary vision that James had of the main elements of each central character, the thesis seeks to understand how Isabel Archer and Lambert Strether are subsequently shaped, and developed, by way of the incidents and experiences they meet, and what they make of them. Of primary importance amongst these are the relations they form with the other characters in the novel. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2000.

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