Music Welcome to snoozecast, the podcast designed to help you fall asleep. Find us on snoozecast.com and follow us on Instagram at snoozecast where you'll find behind the scenes content. If you enjoy our show, please write a review on the podcast app. Also, share us with a friend. If you'd like to get an email once a week with what sleep stories we're coming at with that week, along with any snoozecast news, subscribe to the snooze letter at snoozecast.com. This episode is brought to you by our Patreon supporters and by Flowers of Speech. Tonight we'll read the opening to Washington Square written by Henry James and published in 1880. The novel recounts the conflict between a dull but sweet daughter and her brilliant, unemotional father. The plot of the novel is based upon a true story told to James by his close friend, a British actress. The book is often compared with Jane Austin's work, who of course wrote Pride and Prejudice for the clarity and grace of its prose and its intense focus on family relationships. This is the second time Henry James is featured on Snewscast. You can find the turn of the screw back in October 2019. Let's get cozy. Close your eyes. Relax your body into the softness of your Now take a few deep breaths. During a portion of the first half of the present century, and more particularly during the latter part of it. They're flourished and practiced in the city of New York, a physician who enjoyed perhaps an exceptional share of the consideration which in the United States has always been bestowed upon distinguished members of the medical profession. This profession in America has constantly been held in honor, and more successfully than elsewhere has put forward a claim to the epithet of liberal in a country in which to play a social part, you must either earn your income or make believe that you earn it. The healing art has appeared in a high degree to combine two recognized sources of credit. It belongs to the realm of the practical, which in the United States is a great recommendation, and it is touched by the light of science. A merit appreciated in a community in which the love of knowledge has not always been accompanied

by leisure and opportunity. It was an element in Dr. Sloper's reputation that his learning

and his skill were very evenly balanced. He was what you might call a scholarly doctor, and yet there was nothing abstract in his remedies, he always ordered you to take something. Though he was felt to be extremely thorough, he was not uncomfortably theoretic. And if he sometimes explained matters rather more minutely than might seem of use to the patient, he never went so far like some practitioners one has heard of, as to trust to the explanation alone, but always left behind him an inscrutable prescription. There were some doctors that left the prescription without offering any explanation at all, and he did not belong to that class either, which was, after all, the most vulgar, it will be seen that I am describing a clever man. And this is really the reason why Dr. Sloper had become a local celebrity. At the time at which we are chiefly concerned with him, he was some fifty years of age, and his popularity was at its height. He was very witty, and he passed in the best society of New York for a man of the world, which, indeed, he was in a very sufficient degree. I hasten to add to anticipate possible misconception that he was not the least of a charlatan. He was a thoroughly honest man, honest in a degree of which he had perhaps lacked the opportunity to give the complete measure. And putting aside the great good nature of the circle in which he practiced, which was rather fond of boasting that it possessed the brightest doctor in the country. He daily justified his claim to the talents attributed to him by the popular voice. He was an observer, even a philosopher, and to be bright was so natural to him, and, as the popular voice said, came so easily that he never aimed at mere effect, and had none of the little tricks and pretensions of second-rate reputations, it must be confessed that fortune had favoured him, and that he had found the path to prosperity very soft to his tread. He had married at the age of 27 for love a very charming girl, Miss Catherine Harrington of New York, who in addition to her charms had brought him a solid dowry. Mrs. Sloper was amiable, graceful, accomplished, elegant. And in 1820, she had been one of the pretty girls of the small but promising capital, which clustered

about the battery and overlooked the bay, and of which the uppermost boundary was indicated by the grassy way sides of Canal Street.

Even at the age of 27,

Austin's grassy way sides of Canal Street. Even at the age of 27, Austin Sloper had made his mark sufficiently to mitigate the anomaly of his having been chosen among a dozen suitors by a young woman of high fashion, who had ten thousand dollars of income and the most charming eyes in the island of Manhattan, eyes. And some of their accompaniments were for about five years a source of extreme satisfaction to the young physician who was

both a devoted and a very happy husband. The fact of his having married a rich woman made no difference in the line he had traced for himself, and he cultivated his profession with as definite a purpose as if he still had no other resources than his fraction of the modest patrimony which on his father's death he had shared with his brothers and sisters. This purpose had not been proponderantly to make money. It had been rather to learn something and to do something, to learn something interesting, and to do something useful. This was, roughly speaking, the program he had sketched, and of which the accident of his wife having an income appear to him in no degree to modify the validity. He was fond of his practice and of exercising a skill of which he was agreeably conscious. And it was so patent a truth that if he were not a doctor, there was nothing else he could be, that a doctor he persisted in being in the best possible conditions. Of course, his easy domestic situation saved him a good deal of drudgery, and his wife's affiliation to the best people brought him a good many of those patients whose symptoms are, if not more interesting in themselves than those of the lower orders, at least more consistently displayed, he desired experience. And in the course of twenty years, he had got a great deal. It must be added that it came to him in some forms which whatever might have been their intrinsic value made it the reverse of welcome his first child a little boy of extraordinary promise as the doctor who was not addicted to easy enthusiasm firmly believed, died at three years of age, in spite of everything that the mother's tenderness and the father's science could invent to save him.

Two years later Mrs. Sloberg gave birth to a second infant, an infant of a sex which rendered the poor child to the doctor's sense, an inadequate substitute for his lamented firstborn, of whom he had promised himself to make an admirable man. The little girl was a disappointment, but this was not the worst. A week after her birth, the young mother, who, as the phrase is, had been doing well, suddenly betrayed alarming symptoms. And before another week had elapsed, Austin The sloper was a widower. For a man whose trade was to keep people alive, he had certainly done poorly in his own family. And a bright doctor who within three years loses his wife and his little boy should perhaps be prepared to see either his skill or his affection impugned. Our friend, however, escaped criticism. That is, he escaped all criticism but his own, which was much the most competent and most formidable. He walked under the weight of this very private censure for the rest of his days, and bore forever the scars of a castigation, to which the strongest hand he knew had treated him on the night that followed his wife's death. world which, as I have said, appreciated him,

pitted him too much to be ironical.

His misfortune made him more interesting

and even helped him to be the fashion.

Even medical families cannot escape

the more insidious forms of disease and that, after all, Dr. Slooper had lost other patients beside the two I have mentioned, which constituted an honorable precedent. His little girl remained to him, and though she was not what he had desired, he proposed to himself to make the best of her. He had on hand a stalk of unexpended authority, by which the child, in its early years, profited largely. She had been named as a matter of course after her poor mother and even in her most diminutive babyhood, the doctor never called her anything but Catherine. She grew up a very robust and healthy child, and her father, as he looked at her, often said to himself that, such as she was, he at least need have no fear of losing her. I say such as she was because to tell the truth. But this is a story of which I will defer the telling. When the child was about ten years old, he invited his sister, Mrs. Peniman, to come and stay with him. The Miss Sloopers had been but two in number, and both of them had married early in life. The younger Mrs. Almond by name was the wife of a prosperous merchant and the mother of a blooming family. She bloomed herself, indeed, and was a comely, comfortable, reasonable woman, and a favorite with her clever brother, who, in the matter of women, even when they were nearly related to him, was a man of distinct preferences. He preferred Mrs. Omen to his sister Lavinia, who had married a poor clergyman of a sickly constitution and a flowery style of eloquence. And then at the the age of 33, had been left a widow without children, without fortune, with nothing but the memory of Mr. Penamins flowers of speech, a certain vague aroma of which hovered around her own conversation.

Never the A certain vague aroma of which hovered around her own conversation. Nevertheless, he had offered her a home under his own roof, which Levinia accepted, with the alacrity of a woman who had spent the ten years of her married life in the town of Bukipsi. The doctor had not proposed to Mrs. Peniman to come and live with him indefinitely. He had suggested that she should make an asylum of his house while she looked about for unfurnished lodgings. It is uncertain whether Mrs. Peniman ever instituted a search for unfurnished lodgings, but it is beyond dispute that she never found them. She settled herself with her brother and never went away. And when Catherine was 20 years old, her Aunt Lavigne was still one of the most striking features of her immediate entourage. This is Penamann's own account of the matter was that she had remained to take charge of her niece's education. She had given this account, at least, to everyone but the doctor, who never asked for explanations which he could entertain himself any day with inventing. Mrs. Peniman, moreover, though she had a good deal of a certain sort of artificial assurance, shrank for indefinable reasons from presenting herself to her brother as a fountain of instruction. She had not a high sense of humor, but she had enough to prevent her from making this mistake, and her brother on his side had enough to excuse her in her situation, for laying him under contribution during a considerable part of a lifetime.

He therefore ascended tacitly to the proposition which Mrs. Peniman had tacitly laid down that it was of importance that the poor motherless girl should have a brilliant woman near her. His ascent could only be tacit, for he had never been dazzled by his sister's intellectual lustre. Save when he fell in love with Catherine Harrington. He had never been dazzled, indeed, by any feminine characteristics, whatever. And though he was to a certain extent, what is called a lady's doctor, his private opinion of the more complicated sex was not exalted. He regarded its complications as more curious than edifying, and he had an idea of the beauty of reason, which was, on the whole, meagerly gratified by what he observed in his female patience. His wife had been a reasonable woman, but she was a bright exception Among several things that he was sure of. This was perhaps the principle. Such a conviction, of course, did little either to mitigate or to abbreviate his widowhood, And it set a limit to his recognition at the best of Catherine's possibilities and of Mrs. Penamins' administrations. He, nevertheless, at the end of six months, accepted his sister's permanent presence as an accomplished fact, and as Catherine grew older, perceived that there were, in effect, good reasons why she should have a companion of her own imperfect sex. He was extremely polite to Levinia, scrupulously, formally polite. And she had never seen him in anger, but once in her life, life, when he lost his temper in a theological discussion with her late husband. With her he never discussed theology, nor indeed discussed anything. He contented himself with making known very distinctly in the form of a lucid ultimatum, his wishes with regard to Catherine. Once, when the girl was about 12 years old, He had said to her, try and make a clever woman of her, Livinia, I should like her to be a very clever woman. Mrs. Peniman at this looked thoughtful a moment. My dear Austin, she then inquired, do you think it is better to be clever than to be good? Good for what? Ask the doctor. You were good for nothing unless you were clever. From this assertion, Mrs. Peniman saw no reason to dissent. She possibly reflected that her own great use in the world was owing to her aptitude for many things. Of course I wish Catherine to be good. The doctor said, next day, but she won't be any the less virtuous for not being a fool. I'm not afraid of her being wicked. She had never had the salt of malice in her character. She is as good as good bread, as the French say. But six years hence, I don't want to have to compare her to good bread and butter. Are you afraid she will turn in sippard? My dear brother, it is I who supply the butter so you need in fear," said Mrs. Peniman, who had taken, in hand, the child's accomplishments. Overlooking her at the piano, where Catherine displayed a certain talent and going with her to the dancing class where it must be confessed that she made but a modest figure. Mrs. Peniman was a tall, thin, fair, rather fated woman with a perfectly amiable disposition, a high standard of gentility, a taste for light literature, and a certain foolish indirectness and obliquity of character. She was romantic. She was sentimental. She had a passion for little secrets and mysteries, a very innocent passion. For her secrets had hither to always been as unpractical as adult eggs. She was not absolutely voracious, but this defect was of no great consequence. For she had never had anything to conceal. She would have liked to have a lover, and to correspond with him under an assumed name in letters left at a shop. I am bound to say that her imagination never carried the intimacy farther than this.

Mrs. Peniman had never had a lover, but her brother, who was very shrewd, understood her turn of mind. When Catherine is about 17, he said to himself, LaVinia will try and persuade her that some young man with a mustache is in love with her. It will be quite untrue, no young man with a mustache or without. We'll ever be in love with Catherine, but Lavigne will take it up and talk to her about it. Perhaps even if her taste for clandestine operations doesn't prevail with her, she will talk to me about it. Catherine won't see it and won't believe it, fortunately for her peace of mind, for Catherine isn't romantic. She was a healthy, well-grown child without a trace of her mother's beauty. She was not ugly. She had simply a plain, dull, gentle countenance. The most that had ever been said for her was that she had a nice face. And, though she was an aeros, no one had ever thought of regarding her as a bell. Her father's opinion of her moral purity was abundantly justified. She was excellently, imperturbably good, affectionate, and d'asile, obedient,

and imperturbably good. Affectionate, docile, obedient, and much addicted to speaking the truth. In her younger years, she was a good deal of a romp, and though it is an awkward confession to make about one's heroine, I must add that she was something of a glutton. She never, that I know of, stole raisins out of the pantry, but she devoted her pocket money to the purchase of cream cakes. As regards this, however, a critical attitude would be inconsistent with a candid reference to the early annals of any biographer. Catherine was decidedly not clever. She was not quick with her book, nor indeed with anything else. She was not abnormally deficient, and she mustered learning enough to acquit herself respectively in conversation with her contemporaries, among whom it must be about, however, that she occupied a secondary place. It is well known that in New York, it is possible for a young girl to occupy a primary one. Catherine, who was extremely modest, had no desire to shine. on most social occasions, as they are called, you would have found her lurking in the background. She was extremely fond of her father, and very much afraid of him. She thought him, the cleverest and handsomest and most celebrated of men. The poor girl found her account so completely in the exercise of her affections that the little tremor of fear that mixed itself with her filial passion gave the thing an extra relish rather than blunted its edge. Her deepest Desire was to please him and her conception of happiness was to know that she had succeeded in pleasing him. She had never succeeded beyond a certain point. Though, the whole, he was very kind to her. She was perfectly aware of this, and to go beyond the point in question seemed to her really something to live for. she could not know. of course, was that she disappointed him. Though on three or four occasions, the doctor had been almost frank about it. She grew up peacefully and prosperously. But at the age of 18 Mrs. Peniman had not made a clever woman of her. Dr. Slooper would have liked to be proud of his daughter, but there was nothing to be proud of in poor Catherine. There was nothing, of course, to be ashamed of. But this was not enough for the doctor, who was a proud man, and would have enjoyed being able to think of his daughter as an unusual girl.

There would have been a fitness in her being pretty and graceful, intelligent and distinguished. for her mother had been the most charming woman of her little day.

And as regards her father, of course, he knew his own value. He had moments of irritation at having produced a commonplace child. And he even went so far at times as to take a certain satisfaction in the thought that his wife had not lived to find her out. He was naturally slow So in making discovery himself, and it was not till Catherine had become a young lady grown that he regarded the matter as settled. He gave her the benefit of a great many doubts. He was in no haste to conclude. Mrs. Peniman frequently assured him that his daughter had a delightful nature, but He knew how to interpret this assurance.

It... had a delightful nature, but he knew how to interpret this assurance. It meant to his sense that Catherine was not wise enough to discover that her aunt was a goose, a limitation of mind that could not fail to be agreeable to Mrs. Peniman. Both she and her brother, however, exaggerated the young girl's limitations for Catherine, So she was very fond of her aunt and conscious of the gratitude she owed her, regarded her without a particle of that gentle dread which gave it stamp to her admiration of her father. To her mind there was nothing of the infinite about Mrs. Peneman. Catherine saw her all at once as it were were, and was not dazzled by the apparition. Whereas her father's great faculties seemed as they stretched away to lose themselves in a sort of luminous vagueness which indicated not that they stopped, but that Catherine's own mind ceased to follow them. must not be supposed that Dr. Sloper visited his disappointment upon the young girl, or ever let her suspect that she had played him a trick. On the contrary, for fear of being unjust to her, he did his duty with exemplary zeal and recognized that she was a faithful and affectionate child. Besides, he was a philosopher. He smoked a good many cigars over his disappointment, and in the fullness of time he got used to it, he satisfied himself that he had expected nothing, though indeed with a certain oddity of reasoning. I expect nothing.

He said to himself, so that if she gives me a surprise, it will be all clear again. If she doesn't, it'll be no loss. This was about the time Catherine had reached her 18th year so that it will be seen her father had not been precipitated. At this time, she seemed not only incapable of giving surprises. It was almost a question whether she could have received one. she was so quiet and irresponsible. People who expressed themselves roughly called her solid. but she was irresponsible because she was shy, uncomfortably, painfully shy. This was not always understood.

And she sometimes produced an impression of insensibility. In reality, she was the softest creature in the world. you you you you

...