The weekly times-record. (Valley City, N.D.) 1912-1922, 1921-04-28

j Others say that some Of his state
ments are affronts to the "highS NOR
alities" Of life and Sherman maintains
that 3He is not an historian of man
ners he is trenchant idealistic critic
Of life from the aesthetic point of
view" Dixon Scott an English writer
insists that James depicts the simple;
the humble. the commonplace the low
ly, the neglected and even talks about
the humility Of Mr.. James," Others
hold that he is the patrician who "has
no use for and has insulted all the
popular gods of democratic society"
Some critics hold that "The Turn Of
the Screw" is the most wonderful and
the greatest ghost story every writ
ten yet Phelps speaks of it as "Th9us-
ands Of words without really saying
anything" and VIM. D. Howells dis
misses it as romantic rot" In gen
eral his novels have probably been bet
ter received in England than in Amer
lea. One writer says that: 'The
English press has lionized him, their
own Meredith receiving almost less
qualified appreciation" Of his death
the London Daily Mail, however,
writes with a. seeming touch of sar-
casm: 1T (his personality has not
profited us long but there was more
Joy in heaven when James came than
if Mr.. Bryan had repented."
Whatever the novels of Mr.. James
are, it seems that one will never find
out from his critics. We will have
to give him credit for having so COM
pletely confounded his critics, that
they truly "either love him or de-
spise him, ignore him they cannot"
If you really want to know what
James is and what he tries to do take
my advice and read him for yourself.
While Henry James has written nov
els almost innnmerable, he is not
widely read though he seems to have
a small group of readers who really
are devoted to him. He has the dis
tinction Of giving to the world a new
Kind Of novel in both content and
style. The international novel is his
gift to the world and the information
al situation" is his theme in most Of
his books. In this he contrasts the
customs, manners, and ideals of Amer
lea with those of Europe. This is par
ticularly true of his early novels in
which he exhibits the American as
lacking in the necessary social graces.
He throws upon the screen, with the
European life and society as back
ground, the American travellers in such
a way that their manners. customs,
and ideals constantly appear to their
disadvantage, lacking the polish.
grace, and beauty demanded by Eur
opean society. An interesting phase
of his novels is that no one, not even
the critics, seem to be agreed as to
what James really tries to do or what
the underlying motive is if there is
one. That James belongs to school
of realists, some say the romantic
realist, there seems to be no doubt
but farther than that no one seems to
be able TODD. Some say that his early
works are sermons on social right
eousness and that his later work repre-
sents "art for arts sake" whatever
that means. James. himself, does not
seem to be very anxious to enlighten
his reader. He makes the readers
problem even more difficult by imply
ing that there is an underlying thread
going through all his novels which
no one has been able to discover. S. p.
Sherman gives the following quota
ton: There's an idea in my work
without which I wouldn't have given
straw for the whole Job 1t stretch
es from book to book and everything
else plays comparatively over the sur
face of it. The order, the form, the
texture of my books will perhaps some
day constitute for the initiated COM.
plete representation of it," This quo
tation seems to define at least one
characteristic element in. his novels.
He keeps you guessing constantly.
This is true of elements within each
of his novels as we'll as for the nov
els as whole The reader does not
know what to expect-in fact the ex-
pected never happens.
James says that ''The novel is his
tory" That is the only general de-,
scription we may give to it. The air
of reality (solidity Of specifcation)
seems to me to be the supreme virtue
of the NOVELETTE, merit on which all
its other merits helplessly and sub
missive1y depend" "The only reason
for the novels existence is that it does
attempt to represent life. The SUI
preme faculty of the novelist is a ca.
pacity for receiving straight impress
sions.'' Such is his conception of the
novel but he can hardly be said to have
lived up to it. As to impressions, his
novels bear evidence on every page of
this for in receiving impressions
James surely was genius. In my
opinion, however. the impressions are
those Of Henry James "ipse dixit"
and the reader needs to be, on his
guard lest he take them for bis own.
While his novels are impressions they
can hardly be called history. IN fact
nearly all the critics seem to insist
that he lacks the historic sense, and
some say that his world is an imagin-
ary world.
To the saying that VIM. James
wrote psychology like fiction and that
Henry james wrote novels like psy-
chology Phelps has given more lucid
characterization by saying that Will
liam made the reading of metaphysics
easy while Henry made novel reading
difficult. His novels are difficult in
more ways than one. They are merely