One of Henry James’ main themes was the interaction between the Old World and the New. Restless Baroness Eugenia Munster and her charming bohemian brother Felix are visiting their American cousins in Boston, New England. The effect these two extravagant characters have on their austere Puritan relations forms the substance of the book and is told in a series of scenes or ‘sketches’.

The author writes with subtly observed good humour which accelerates and escalates into higher comedy as Felix, the main protagonist, manipulates his cousins emotional affiliations. James is most impartial and so the wit is at the expense of neither faction, although one suspects that his sympathies lie more with the European temperament rather than the cloistered sensibilities of New England, a suspicion given credence by the fact that, after living in Britain for twenty years, he eventually obtained citizenship.

In a letter to the publisher, outlining his plan for the novel, James wrote; ‘I agree to squeeze my buxom muse… I will lace her so tight that she shall have the neatest little figure in the world. It shall be a very joyous little romance..’ He succeeded brilliantly.

Collection	Narrator	Length
American	Peter Joyce	7 hrs 45 mins

Media	Compact Disc
Media Qty	7
Audio Format	CD-DA
Book Code	AM-311CD
ISBN	978 1 86015 065 4
Price	£21.49

Henry James (1843–1916) was an American-born author and literary critic. Born in New York City into a wealthy, intellectually inclined family, James travelled with his family back and forth between Europe and America. At the age of 19, he briefly attended Harvard Law School, but he much preferred reading and writing fiction to studying law. From an early age James read, criticized, and learned from the classics of English, American, French, Italian, German and (in translation) Russian literature.

In 1864, he anonymously published his first short story and from then devoted himself completely to literature. He wrote 22 novels and is one of the major figures of trans-Atlantic literature. His works frequently juxtapose characters from different worlds—the Old World (Europe), simultaneously artistic, corrupting, and alluring; and the New World (United States), where people are often brash, open, and assertive—and explore how this clash of personalities and cultures affects the two worlds.

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