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

that he was an American; and tina
meant, for his type and generation
that he could never feel at home unit
he was in exile" Let me state at tn,
outset that I wish to maintain tn,
thesis that whatever, he was, he wa!
not an American.
When Henry James shortly aftel
the opening Of the World War, re
nounced his supposed allegiance to the
land Of his nativity and became {
naturalized citizen Of Great Britain
his adopted country, he, to my mind
threw off the mantle which, made his
life and work appear something that
it was not and performed an act which
should properly have been executed
during or after the Civil War. Most
Of his critics take him to task fol
severing his bonds Of citizenship with
America, yet Of all the things he did
and wrote nothing Is more Ineligible
and nothing could better have made
clear many Of the obscurities in his
career and literary work. In re-
nouncing his citizenship in America
he, to my mind, performed a real SER
vice for his readers of the present, as
we'll as those Of the future. The act
was logical conclusion to a life which
heart and soul had belonged to Eu-
rope from early infancy Americans
are not born they are formed and
moulded by the life, the institutions:
and the spirit that is peculiar to our
country. .@I
If Henry James is ever to be ap-
preciated by the American reader, it
can not be by trying to maintain that
he is an American novelist. The
scathing remarks from some Ameri-
can readers and even critics to my
mind are not evoked by his type of
novel so much as it is by the fact that
real patriotic American who knew
American life and character could not
so shamefully and enormously have
misrepresented the real American. As
A British subject who knows only the
American tourist, we can make al
lowances for his grotesque represen-
tation of individuals, who, having ac-
cumulated fortunes 60 to Europe and
there try to ape character and life
which they cannot understand and in
towhich they cannot possibly fit.
Only one writer, P. S. Sherman, OF
those l have read seems to have de-
vined the true character of James.
While he does not wish to take the
title of American novelist from him:
he does say that "He (James) went
body and soul to Europe"
Imagine to yourself trying to mould
an American through process some
what as follows: Give him parents
of English descent, cultured and re-
fined, imbued with the idea that the
American school, life and character
is not a suitable environment for a
growing child. Rebecca West says:
speaking Of William and Henry
James: From their fathers preoc-
cupation they gained rationalized
consciousness that America was an
incomplete environment. that in Eur
ope there were many mines OF treas,
ure which they must find and rifle it
they hoped for health Of their minds
and the salvation of their souls"
Give him an infant baptism in Eur
opean life for year or more; shield
him from the American public school
and keep him from contact with the
"vuIgar, unreined, and uncultivated"
American child and youth Of common
clay. Phelps says: "He was saved
from the waste and loss Of our con-
ventional school system receiving the
incompatible advantages of Europe"
Give him another hypo-from the
elite of Europe for four years in his
early teens. give him an accident
which prevents him from becoming an
active participant in our Civil War;
give him an independent fortune:
such that he may never want for the
necessities of lifea and have leisure
in abundance. BrowneH says:
s'Neither necessity nor opportunity
has prevented him from doing: appar-
emily, just what he wanted" Give
him italian, Swiss. French. and Eng.
lish tutors in language and art; and
finally leave him to spend his life IN
Europe making his home among the
elite of London and visiting Europ-
can countries at leisure. The result
should be the finished product Henry
James, the American.
H. C. Vedder says about him that he
believes in Europe-she alone can give
to America and the An1eri-
can what his uncouth ma
ture needs to- make him really
civilized. "'You are in all things less
than the least Of these-except per-
haps in native goodness which doesn't
count" The idle leisure class seems
to be his social ideal as well as his
theme. S.. P. Sherman says: HE
seemed weary of the obtuseness of the
general public and despaired OF as
we'll as despised it." In his later
years he very blandly, very courteous
tiy sent the whole general public to
the DEVIL His contempt Of the gen.
serar public is characterized by a ques-
ton directed to John Hay at an ova-
ton given in his honor at South
hampton: "What impression does it
make upon your mind to have these
insects creeping about you and say
ing things about you?"
So much for James, the man. It is
clear that he is not a democrat but
rather a patrician. Some have sug-
gested that James is the real cosmo-
politan but even here one writer OBJ
jects that cosmopolitan should at
least be at home in his own country.