I plumb the subtleties of Henry James

The Golden Bowl ****
by Henry James

I figured I wasn't old enough to read "The Golden Bowl" until this year (and here it is the eve of my 57th birthday). The novel is considered by many to be Henry James' masterwork, and certainly its ever-changing points of view and revelations are almost excruciatingly subtle. I'm pretty sure that I would have to read the book several times to get all its delicate little nuances, which are pretty much why people love James or find him tiresome beyond endurance.

The set up is simple: American widower and millionaire Adam Verver and his grown daughter and only heiress, Maggie, marry, respectively, a brilliant American adventuress and an impoverished Italian prince. Unknown to the Ververs, Charlotte, the adventuress and the Prince, were lovers before their marriages, and the fact that father and daughter seem to be somewhat oblivious allows the lovers to take up their affair again.

***SPOILERS*** Eventually Maggie suspects an affair, showing she has some hidden depths. However, in order to spare her father's happiness, her confrontation of the lovers cannot be made directly. So, for hundreds of pages, we watch as an elaborate game of strategy plays out in which none of the players is completely sure of what the other players know.

It is also unclear who is being victimized and who is doing the victimizing. At first, the Ververs seem to be the dupes of Charlotte and the Prince. But as the story unfolds, the Prince and Charlotte seem to be viewed by the Ververs as errant pets, purchased like the baubles the millionaire collects for his museum back in America City--and to keep off more vulgar and predatory gold-diggers. There is also something unnatural, about Maggie's emotional attachment to her father, whom she esteems more than and certainly spends more time with than the Prince.

The book is claustrophobic in its analogies of silken leashes, gilded cages and circumscribed rooms as the affair between Charlotte and the Prince strains family ties, but also drags people closer together in webs of complicity.

I was struck by the relatively minor character, Fanny Assingham (could James NOT have been aware of the hideous associations in such a name?). She is a friend of the major characters and has something to do with introducing them to each other and setting events in motion--though to a lesser extent than she would wish. She is nothing so much as an officious Polonius figure who spends hours telling her husband, Colonel Bob, how magnificently or beautifully--two adjectives that occur frequently and with many shadings--various characters, including herself, will be in the face of various circumstances, though it's clear her interest in the lives of her friends is largely of a prurient nature.

Bob listens idly, chain smokes, and helpfully asks Fanny the same questions that occur to the reader. One senses Bob has everybody's number well before anyone else does and would rather be playing bridge or having a snort at his club.

I liked him the best.