Henry James
Henry James (1843-1916) was an American novelist and close friend to RLS. Some of his most notable works are Daisy Miller (1878), The Portrait of a Lady (1881), The Turn of the Screw (1898), The Wings of the Dove (1902) and The Ambassadors (1903). He often wrote from the point of view of his characters, and his innovative style, using unreliable narrators and interior monologues, strongly influenced modernist writing. Although mostly known for his realist fiction, James also wrote literary criticism, plays, works on travel writing, biographical and autobiographical works.=
James was born in New York City. He studied law at Harvard University , but like RLS, he wanted to be a writer and focused instead on his literary ambitions. Although an American, James felt that he identified more with Europe. Indeed, he was preoccupied with national identity. Much of his writing centers on what happens in the meeting between American and European cultures. In the end, James’s life seemed to suggest that national identity is a choice – he settled in England in 1876 and became a British citizen in 1915.
