Roderick Hudson: Books I-III

Capolavoro poco conosciuto della prima fase letteraria di Henry James (1875). Con note esplicative. Arrivato in perfette condizioni.

A reckless selfish egotist, Roderick was destined for a sticky end. His friends rather hindered than helped his restless artistic manouvres, pandering to his every whim and walking on egg shells around him. Having Mrs Hudson and Mary Garland shipped over to Rome only exacerbated the problem of Roderick's defiant hedonistic lifestyle. Though one need simply look at the mother to understand the son. Eventually, Mrs Hudson's raison d'etre was making everyone feel as guilty as possible...while her cousin and companion maintained a stiff upper lip in the face of adversity. Why they did not hightail it back to America at the first, second and third sign of trouble, is a mystery. Prefering to drag around after Rowland and his bag of trick plans to amuse the people he had undertaken to be responsible for. Being an idle kind of guy, Rowland swanned around Europe, amusing himself mostly by poking his nose into other people's love affairs and taking the development of Roderick's genius on himself as far as that went. He seemed to live in a constant state of semi denial of his unrequited love for Miss Buttoned Lips. It all ended very suddenly and dramatically, but not before one of those many unbelievable coincidences of meeting in an exact same corner of Europe with the very culprits who had caused endless anxiety back in Rome.

Early (1875) novel by James, still writing in an accessible, if florid, style which is a delight to read. All the themes are present here that the author would develop more fully in future work. The unconscious (I believe) homoerotic subtext gives this book a unique place in James's novels. But it is the writer's love affair with Italy that stays with the reader!

There is nothing wrong as such with this text, it is free after all, and James is always a pleasure to read. However, there is no information that this is the 1878 edition rather than the substantially altered (in my view, improved) New York edition of this first 'official' novel by James. The story in either edition is worth reading, there are moments in the middle of the book where the plot drags and I found myself turned off, but otherwise this is great stuff and highly instructive for any writer who wishes to learn how to write about consciousness and go deeply into characters, which is one of James' strongest points and skills even in this early novel. The reluctance to like the later edition is widespread, I don't share it. A few examples, if you get the 1907 edition (e.g. from New Paltz) will show you the superiority of his developed style.

Not quite, but by comparison with late James, it's one his better novels.THE AMERICAN, another early novel, and HUDSON are the best entry points for a fledgling reader of James' novels.As time goes by, James slowly becomes more and more obscure, though with some wonderful interruptions to the pattern in the carpet, most notably THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY, his greatest novel, THE PRINCESS CASAMASSIMA, and THE BOSTONIANS, major works of 19th century fiction. By the time he reaches THE AKWARD AGE sense is compromised by "subtlety", which reaches its zenith in THE GOLDEN BOWL, a novel that certainly should have been called MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING, if Shakespeare hadn't already used the title.TURN OF THE SCREW is a great novella, there are some wonderful short stories and literary criticism that ranges from excellent to trite. Otherwise, the place of Henry James in the history of literature amounts to a decline from talent and sense to formal fussiness and moral insignificance.