February Group Read: Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

Welcome, everyone! This thread is for anyone who would like to join in on a group read of Portrait of a Lady by Henry James.

I haven't read much by James, but I know to expect difficult sentence structure. Unless there are any objections, lets feel free to discuss as we go. Just start any post that may contain a spoiler with an alert about which chapter it refers to.

Hope there are lots of readers for this book!

Thanks for setting this up!

I've got my ebook downloaded from Project Gutenberg and loaded on my Kobo ready to go. It's in two parts, Volume 1 and Volume 2, which made me blink a bit because ebook files generally are just not that large so why break it into two? Unless it was originally published as two volumes? I could see the PG folks wanting to preserve the original format.

I think it was originally published serially, I would assume in much smaller chunks than two volumes. I'm not sure why they would format it in two separate parts.

I read part of the introduction today and was happy to read that James's sentences got more convoluted when he began dictating his work later in his career instead of writing his novels longhand. Since Portrait of a Lady is one of his earlier works, this shouldn't be as much of a barrier.

I read Portrait of a Lady several years ago and remember loving it but can't remember any details! I read it in quick succession with Vanity Fair and have the two all mixed up in my mind.

I expect to start reading this book in a week or so.

It's great to find this thread, since I am planning to read Portrait of a Lady in February, and I am a little intimidated by it.

>4 japaul22: Serial publication makes sense. However many parts it's in, I'm looking forward to starting it on Sunday.

I'll try and give it a go!

I started it today. This is a reread for me but, though I remember loving the book, I can't remember any of the plot! I've only read the first 50 pages, but I'm remembering as I read, though nothing ahead as of yet.

I've read pretty many books from this era, so I'm finding it a comfortable and comforting read so far.

How is everyone faring? I'm finding it pretty similar to other books I've read from the era - in a good way. Meaning I'm not finding it particularly hard, but it is kind of slow to read.

***Chapter 18**** SPOILERS

I've just finished this chapter and now I see the basic set up. I'm interested to see how the money that Mr. Touchett leaves her will or will not influence her choices, especially concerning marriage. Having already turned down two men who could easily support her without the advantage of a large fortune, I wonder how visible the change will be. I also have to say that I much prefer Lord Warburton to Caspar Goodwood!

Well, I am just at the beginning--chapter 4 or 5 I think. So far, I do like it, but it's not a quick read. What a strange family!

I've gotten past the half way mark now.

What really bothers me is that none of the characters feels real to me. I don't really care about any of them, and most of them seem amazingly silly. That goes double for Madame Merle. I'm used to male authors not getting the women to feel right, but in this book the women are at least shaped paper maché, but the men barely reach the status of flat cardboard, so it's not (just) a gender issue.

The back cover of my copy says, 'Henry James depicts the heart and soul of a young woman' (...) Well, maybe so, but I can't see it.

>9 japaul22: Chapter 26: Either of those two men would be a big improvement over the one she's seeing now.

>9 japaul22: I feel horrible because I downloaded this book with every intention of starting it weeks ago but you got me with the Meyer Spacks annotated edition of P&P so I blame you fully for delaying my starting Portrait of a Lady. ;-)

I will get to it and report back. Promise!

I finished it.

Spoiler*************

How can you write a book over 500 pages long, and not give it a proper ending?

I am most of the way through, and curious to see how it plays out. I am SO glad to live in a century in which women have rights in marriage. And what about the poor robot-daughter, Pansy? Kind of creepy.

I'm about 75% done now and tending to concur with MarthaJeanne. I really do not like any of these characters or find them to be realistic portrayals of how humans interact. I'm reserving judgment til I finish, but I'm not finding it to the be the 5 star read that I thought it was the first time I read it years ago.

>14 banjo123: Pansy drives me crazy!!

>12 luvamystery65: Well, that annotated P&P is well worth it! If you end up reading P of a L, I'll keep the thread starred and see if you post anything you'd like to discuss.

Well, I finished it and it definitely didn't live up to the 5 stars I gave it the first time I read it. I think it definitely suffered from comparison to Anthony Trollope's Can you Forgive Her?, which I just read last month. I felt that James was trying for a psychological novel - really trying to get inside the heads of his main characters - but the problem was that I didn't buy their decisions. None seemed true to life.

>13 MarthaJeanne: Yes, the ending was very weak and disappointing.

How many people are still reading? Should we wait until March 1 and then open the thread up to discuss without worrying about plot spoilers? Anyone still reading at that point could just ignore the thread til they are done.

Despite not liking it all that much, I will admit that it did get me kind of worked up with dislike, which I suppose says something. It wasn't just dull.

I just started but I can ignore the thread if I feel like I need to. Honestly, I don't care if I see a spoiler on this one.

I've decided life is too short, so I'm Pearl-ruling this one. Maybe at another time it would hold my attention.

I'm about 40% of the way through it. Like Roberta, I don't care about spoilers with this one.

>18 rosalita: Good for you, Julia - life IS too short. Especially for over 700 pages!

My copy 'only' had about 600 pages. I have no idea why I persisted with it. I guess I thought it had to get better.

If it was seriallized, I can imagine people talking about it as they do now about soaps. On the other hand, I don't watch soaps, and those discussions move me - right out of the room if at all possible.

I finished it, and actually, I liked it. I thought it was a great portrayal of how hard it is to be an independent woman.

Since there isn't a lot of concern about spoilers, I have a few questions/comments after finishing the book. There are tons of spoilers in these questions, so please avoid them and any ensuing discussion if you don't want to know how things end up for Isabel.

1) Any predictions about what will happen to Pansy? Will she just stay docile and obeying? I don't see anything that would lead me to believe she would do otherwise. I was struck, though, by making a comparison between Pansy and Isabel before her marriage. They really couldn't be more different - Isabel wanting to stay independent and discover all life has to offer without tying herself to a man. Pansy at the same age has none of these desires. But in the end, though they start with radically different personalities, they let the same man control them in much the same way.

2) Speaking of the end, were you surprised the Isabel goes back to Osmond? I was so disappointed by that point, that I almost didn't care. Plus I never really wanted her to get together with Caspar Goodwood - he seemed to have a controlling element in his nature as well. If she was going to marry someone, I would have preferred to see her with Lord Warburton. He seemed that he would have given her the most freedom to be herself.

3) What about Mme. Merle? I suspected the back story there right away - nothing made sense otherwise. I think it's a little interesting to think about how the world probably perceived her as a free spirit and independent woman though really, her life had her pretty hemmed in as well.

4) Henrietta Stackpole really annoyed me at the beginning, but by the end I came around to her. THough even she chooses to marry in the end, although presumably to a man who values her for who she is.

>22 japaul22: My thoughts, with lots of SPOILERS

1) Poor Pansy! I assume she will remain docile, but will hopefully increase in her ability to sneakily get her own way (as she did with Washburton) In real life, she would be starting to resent her father pretty soon, but I think maybe not in James' world. I was hoping that Isabel would help her out, into a compromise marriage in which she could be happy.

2) Yes, surprised. I expected/wanted her to march off on her own. I was glad, however, that she didn't trade one man for another... that wouldn't have been a very satisfying ending.

I think that part of James' point is the conflict between independence and desire for social acceptance and connection. I think that even today it's very hard, especially for women, to do both. Isabel wanted to be independent, but I think that one of her flaws was that she wasn't very clear on what she wanted to be independent to do. I think that made her more susceptible to Osmond.

3) Good points about Mme. Merle. I think that her position in the book pointed out that when you have no real power, you have to manipulate people in order to get what you want/need.

4) Henrietta! Great comic character. Interesting that she is the only one in the book to get what seems likely to be a happy marriage.

Also, what do you think of the aunt? She is an interesting example of an independent, but not very admirable, character.

I liked Mrs. Touchett. I liked that she said what she thought, asked the tough questions, and then just removed herself if she didn't like what she heard. Yes, she was a little cold, especially to her husband and son, but I still liked her.

I am also glad that Isabel didn't trade one husband for another. The only ending I would have been really satisfied with is if she just left Osmond and didn't take up with another man, at least for a while.