679 The Jolly Corner by Henry James - Part 1

The History of Literature

Jacke Wilson

History, Books, Arts

4.6 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 17 February 2025

⏱️ 71 minutes

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Summary

Although the writer Henry James (1843-1916) was born in New York City's Washington Square, he spent most of his adulthood in Europe, where he wrote such masterpieces as The Portrait of a Lady, The Wings of the Dove, and The Golden Bowl. Late in life, he returned to New York after a thirty-three year absence to find the city much transformed, as skyscrapers and grand public buildings - museums and libraries and opera houses - now dominated the scene. In this episode, Jacke reads and comments upon the opening of James's 1908 story "The Jolly Corner," in which a man revisits his childhood home in New York after a thirty-three year absence and finds himself chasing memories, ghosts, and other figments of his imagination. Additional listening: 320 Henry James 509 The Figure in the Carpet by Henry James 414 Henry James's Golden Bowl (with Dinitia Smith) The music in this episode is by Gabriel Ruiz-Bernal. Learn more at gabrielruizbernal.com. Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	The History of Literature Podcast is a member of the Podglomerate Network and Lit Hub Radio.
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0:39.4	Hello, today on the podcast, we entered the mind and heart and soul and deepest fears of one
0:46.6	of our heroes, maybe the subtlest writer and on the surface, at least, one of the most
0:51.1	limited human beings, whoever lived. A limited human being.
0:56.0	Living in many ways a cramped and pinched life,
0:59.2	but also a writer who can take hold of me
1:02.2	and shake me like some demonic force,
1:06.3	shaking the flesh loose from a skeleton.
1:09.4	Henry James confronts the jolly corner,
1:12.5	and we confront Henry James, part one, today, on the history of literature.
1:46.3	Hello, everyone. Welcome one and all to the podcast. Your host is here, Jack Wilson, and I am he. Thank you for joining me today. Henry James had terrible blind spots, and yet he was one of the most self-reflective people you'll ever encounter. That's the beauty of him somehow. The self-reflectiveness speaks for itself. In the right
1:52.9	hands, that's a gold mind for a fiction writer. But his blind spots, which can sometimes
1:58.8	frustrate and which can make us scratch our heads when trying
2:03.4	to come to grips with him as a person. Well, that's part of the bargain, too. If James didn't
2:09.7	have his blind spots, he might not be as interesting. This story comes late in his career. He had
2:16.1	left America for Europe. He was gone for 33 years,
2:20.5	like the character in our story. Then he goes back to Britain, kind of shaken by what he'd seen.
2:27.3	Three years later, Henry James wrote this story, The Jolly Corner. And you'd think he might say, maybe with a shudder, I can't believe I ever
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