Daisy Miller
A beautiful American girl, Daisy Miller, is pursued by the sophisticated Winterbourne, who moves in fairly conservative circles. Their courtship is frowned upon by the other Americans they meet in Switzerland and Italy because Daisy is too vivacious and flirtatious and neither belongs to, nor follows the rules of, their society. The novella is a comment on American and European attitudes towards each other and on social and cultural prejudice.
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0recommend
3mentions
2people
2017–2018years
33% neutral67% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Yeah, Henry James is the novelist. William's brother. I'd call his output... mixed, but much of it's really good. Big fan of Washington Square, myself. Probably better to approach shorter novella-ish works like that, and his actual short stories (there are lots) first, and work your way up to the novels (there are also lots of those). Do not start with Daisy Miller. It's among his most famous and widely-read, but just don't.
- That was the first work of his I read, and I didn't like it at all. "Horror" from the 19th century sometimes doesn't hold up too well, and the same concept's been done to death at this point, arguably more effectively. I'm not sure of the history of that conceit, but possibly The Turn of the Screw is famous more for its novelty than for being particularly good per se.
I kept reading him, though, and loved Washington Square. Hated Daisy Miller. The Aspern Papers was fun if not really very good. I'd started reading The Liar and it was very promising, but one of my kids ruined my copy before I finished and I haven't gone back to it yet.
TL;DR give him another try, TTotS isn't his best stuff, and his quality's kinda all over the place.
- I read Daisy Miller and Portrait of a Lady, kind've the same book if you ask me. The ending of Portrait is unsatisfying and meant to be. Does she go back to Osmond? But like Blade Runner, there are two edits:
One ends with Henrietta telling Caspar (in a Graduate Hollywood sort of ending)
“Look here, Mr. Goodwood,” she said; “just you wait!” On which he looked up at her.
http://www.bartleby.com/ebook/adobe/311.pdf
The other continues:
On which he looked up at her-but only to guess, from her face, with a revulsion, that she simply meant he was young. She stood shining at him with that cheap comfort, and it added, on the spot, thirty years to his life. She walked him away with her, however, as if she had given him now the key to patience.
http://www.planetpublish.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/The_...
Even James can't figure out what he wants.
