H. James, The Portrait of a Lady, Chapter 42, 1881

"The novel has become a general inquiry into human beings and the world." This

quote from the famous French novel, Le Roman expérimental, written by Emile Zola in 1880,

makes a statement on the great power of literature, in the 19th century, to renew itself by

exploring the sensibility of one or more characters, to show the social and especially the

psychological evolution of them and, in other words, to describe the complexity of the inner

life, which leads to a stronger affirmation of one's identity. Indeed, the difficulty for the

author is to succeed in interpreting the hesitations and doubts of the characters, as a scientist,

in a novel that reflects the passions of the human being and portrays people, far from an

idealised life, who become close to us. In this text, which is an extract of chapter 42 from The

Portrait of a Lady, published in 1881, Henry James, one of the American authors who

introduced a realist aesthetic into US literature, depicts the complex inner feelings of Isabel

Archer, the main character, as she deals with the disappointment of her marriage with

Osmond, her husband. The internal focalisation used by this heterodiegetic narrator allows

the reader to enter in Isabel's thoughts, skewed by the great gap between what she desires as a

free woman and what social conventions bind her to do. Therefore, Isabel goes through an

almost ontological self-discussion, shifting from the examination of her grief to the

relationship with her husband, which is full of subjective nuances.

How does Henry James explore social and existential issues of his society through the

plot of Isabel Archer's “decrystallization” of her love ?

First, the duality between the “him” and the “her” will be analysed in order to underline

sociological concerns about Victorian marriage. Then, we will see to what extent the inner

monologue allows the reader to have access to an intimate part of Isabel's existence. Finally,

we will discuss how the notion of imagination for Isabel is ambivalent, either a shelter from

the world or a realisation of it.

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