James, Henry

Henry James, OM (15 April 1843 - 28 February 1916)
was an Anglo-American writer who spent the bulk of his career in
Britain. He is regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr. and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James.
James alternated between America and Europe for the first 20 years of his life; eventually he settled in England, becoming a British subject
in 1915, one year before his death. He is best known for a number of
novels showing Americans encountering Europe and Europeans. His method
of writing from the point of view of a character within a tale allows
him to explore issues related to consciousness and perception, and his style in later works has been compared to impressionist painting.
James contributed significantly to literary criticism,
particularly in his insistence that writers be allowed the greatest
possible freedom in presenting their view of the world. James claimed
that a text must first and foremost be realistic and contain a
representation of life that is recognisable to its readers. Good novels,
to James, show life in action and are, most importantly, interesting.
His imaginative use of point of view, interior monologue and possibly unreliable narrators in his own novels and tales brought a new depth and interest to narrative
fiction. An extraordinarily productive writer, in addition to his
voluminous works of fiction he published articles and books of travel, biography, autobiography, and criticism,
and wrote plays, some of which were performed during his lifetime,
though with limited success. His theatrical work is thought to have
profoundly influenced his later novels and tales.James was born at 2 Washington Place in New York City on 15 April 1843. His parents were Mary Walsh and Henry James, Sr..
His father was intelligent, steadfastly congenial, and a lecturer and
philosopher who had inherited independent means from his father, an
Albany, NY banker and investor. Mary came from a wealthy family long
settled in New York City, and her sister Katherine lived with the family
for an extended period of time. Henry, Jr. had three brothers, William who was one year his senior and younger brothers Wilkinson and Robertson. His younger sister was Alice.
The family first lived in Albany and moved to New York City and took
up residence on Fourteenth Street when James was still a young boy. His
education was calculated by his father to expose him to many influences,
primarily scientific and philosophical; it was described as
"extraordinarily haphazard and promiscuous." James did not share the
usual education in Latin and Greek classics, and did not attend
university. Between 1855 and 1860, the James' household traveled to London, Paris, Geneva, Boulogne-sur-Mer and Newport, Rhode Island,
according to the father's current interests and publishing ventures,
retreating to the United States when funds were low. Henry studied
primarily with tutors and briefly attended a few schools while the
family traveled in Europe. Their longest stays were in France, where
Henry began to feel at home, and became fluent in French. In 1860 the
family returned to Newport,
and in 1864 moved to Boston, Massachusetts to be near William, who had
enrolled in the Lawrence Scientific School at Harvard, and then in the
medical school. Henry James could not serve during the Civil War owing to a bad back. In 1862 he attended Harvard Law School,
but realized that he was not interested in studying law. He pursued his
interest in literature and associated with authors and critics William Dean Howells and Charles Eliot Norton in Boston and Cambridge, and formed lifelong friendships with Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., the future Supreme Court Justice, and James and Annie Fields, his first professional mentors.

Created 2015-10-29 by Anna St.Onge.

http://viaf.org/viaf/36920030 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_James