The Portrait of a Lady

Waiting-room reading

The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

Category: I started this book in the summer of 2010, read about 200 pages, then stopped. I picked it up again at the beginning of 2011, read about 100 pages, and stopped again. At last, I’ve finished reading it!

 My thoughts: This is an intriguing book. It’s a great story and is really beautifully written, but it’s not exactly what one would call a page turner—at least not until the last 150 or so pages. It is not a boring book, but there were a couple of times I had to encourage myself to stick with it, and I’m glad I did. It’s an amazing reading experience. However, if finishingWashington Square left me in a somber mood, finishing The Portrait of a Lady made me downright sad.

 The lady in The Portrait of a Lady is Isabel Archer, who I think has one of the most beautiful names in literature. Isabel has a lot going for her, but she lacks street smarts. My favorite character is Ralph Touchett, Isabel’s infirm cousin, who she meets for the first time when her aunt, Ralph’s mother, brings her to England (Ralph has tuberculosis, and I thought of him when I recently read an article about how there is currently a strain of TB that doesn’t respond to most medication. Yikes!). To me, Ralph is truly the heart of this story. Isabel turns down marriage proposals by two suitable suitors, Caspar Goodwood (a Bostonian) and Lord Warburton (an Englishman), because she does not want to give up her independence so soon. She meets the mysterious Gilbert Osmond on her very independent travels throughout Europe, and a union between the two is encouraged by Madame Merle, Osmond’s creepy “friend.” Isabel marries Osmond and settles in Rome. Ralph, like Catherine Sloper’s father in Washington Square, is against the marriage. Isabel, unlike Catherine Sloper, marries the person about whom others have expressed doubts. After the wedding, Osmond’s true evil nature reveals itself (isn’t it always after the wedding?), and Madame Merle’s motives are also revealed. These two are truly horrid people. Isabel is confronted with the fact that she made a bad decision. And she decides to live with it. It’s the grown-up thing to do, but as a reader, you really feel for her.

 Because I read them back to back, The Portrait of a Lady and Washington Square are linked in my mind. Henry James uses the same technique of addressing the reader that he uses in Washington Square, with the same result of making the reader feel invested in the story. However, I think The Portrait of a Lady showcases James’s brilliant writing skills better than Washington Square. Edith Wharton and Henry James get compared to each other a lot. Like Wharton, James writes about what happens after the wedding. And both authors, it seems, preferred realistic endings to traditionally happy ones. But I think I will always prefer Edith Wharton. Around page 450 or so of The Portrait of a Lady, I thought that I probably wouldn’t reread it. But after I finished the book, I changed my mind. But I would like to reread it in the same manner in which I originally read it—dropping in occasionally to see what the characters are doing.

 P.S. One benefit of finishing this book now is that I get a lot of the art history references that previously went right over my head, because I took an art history class last year. It’s quite a nice feeling to know who Henry James is talking about when he mentions Bernini and Caracci. Also, this novel reminds me of Madame X, by John Singer Sargent.

Great passage (Ralph says this to Isabel): “Don’t ask yourself so much whether this or that is good for you. Don’t question your conscience so much—it will get out of tune like a strummed piano. Keep it for great occasions. Don’t try so much to form your character—it’s like trying to pull open a tight, tender young rose. Live as you like best, and your character will take care of itself.”

Up next, Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe