Henry James : Critical Assessments

Henry James is one of the most admired and least appreciated figures in American writing. In a prolific writing career, James is a key transitional figure, not only chronologically between such writers as Jane Austen and George Eliot and the modernists such as Virginia Woolf and James Joyce, but also geographically and culturally. His characters, like himself, move between two very different cultures representative of different values. The choice of material in this outstanding collection attempts both to guage the changing response to James and also to establish how consistent his stature as a writer has been. Volume One offers a series of memories of James from friends, critics, novelists, and poets. Volume Two presents contemporary reviews and views of James''s work from both the United States and Britain, while Volume Three offers a twentieth century overview reflecting the range of responses to James over time. Finally, Volume Four presents a series of twentieth century interpreations to the major works. _