Why do we keep reading?

This wasn't my first encounter with James' "beast." Not more than a few months ago, I was reading this same exact story in my Creative Writing Fiction Workshop, and was equally as intrigued with the piece then as I am now.

The question that still lingers in my mind with regard to this piece is this: What keeps us reading this story? Why don't we give up after the tenth page or so? I don't mean to disrespect James, of course, as the brilliant writer he is, but his The Beast in the Jungle personally wasn't my favorite piece because of how long it keeps us from what seems to be "the point" of the story -- Marcher's shocking revelation, his "deep, dark secret." While we can understand why a reader may become frustrated with James for playing us for so long, only to let us down with a purpose that not only bypasses us, but the protagonist as well, we must also praise James for the aspects of the piece and his writing that do in fact make us want to read the piece in its entirety. If not the structure of the plot, it's the curiosity of his diction and language use, the odd, sexless relationship between his two main characters, and the poignant and suspenseful moments between them that keep us hanging on -- even though we are indeed left hanging at the end. Perhaps we appreciate the piece because we feel like James has pulled one over on us -- building us up to think something dramatic and earth-shattering was going to happen, but having the anti-climactic ending act as the real tragedy and catastrophe in the end.

Maybe that's what keeps us reading.

The “Kill Daisy Miller” Conspiracy

(or “When You Eliminate Everything Else, What Remains is to Kill Daisy Miller”)

Daisy Miller has a rather rushed ending for a novella; Daisy’s sudden sickness and resulting death come all within the last few pages. I think that the last time I read Daisy Miller, the professor said that Henry James often had plots that take a sudden, unexpected turn for the worst. It may just go hand and hand with his other tropes. (I would also like to attest that, after reading the plot summary of one of James’s longer novels, this seems to be prevailingly true. Good thing we aren’t characters in his books.)

Then we have to wonder: if Daisy Miller had lived, what would she be doing in her future?

On one hand, Daisy could have done something rather scandalous and is then metaphorically chased out of European society. It seemed that the novella was heading in that direction already. So why not follow through? I think that the final perception of Europeans and Americans would be different. Europeans would appear very exclusive and maybe even childish for not handling things like a “proper adult.” We would also get mixed messages about what it means to be an American. Are we just beyond hope of reforming into “proper” society? Or maybe only a select few can enter? Overall, this ending seems rather hard on both cases.

How about an ending that had hope for Daisy joining into European society? This instantly brings into mind people chanting “One of us! One of us!” Daisy would no longer be unique. She would have had a period of rebellion, but then she would be tamed and ascend into European culture and society just like most of the characters. Then the novel would just be saying that Americans aren’t very cultured and they all need to ascend and lose their American wildness.

Both of these possible endings for Daisy accomplish, to some degree, what James is already showing us. But they both seem rather dull. Either Daisy conforms or not. Americans are apparently crass, and European society is still a pinnacle that one must reach because we all know Europeans are full of culture. (Yes, that was sarcasm.)

This may have been a case where James just didn’t know what to do with Daisy. To be fair to him, the ending he does have technically works. We don’t know what Daisy’s potential was, and we are left at the height of trying to figure out American versus European debate. It sticks out like a sore thumb compared to the rest of the work, but it may be the best option of those that James had.

Death by Culture

Daisy, who travels Europe but does not seem to appreciate or experience culture, contracts the illness that kills her at the Colosseum, a vestige of Ancient Rome and an incomparable symbol of Europe's history. I didn't know quite what to make of this. James, if not Winterbourne, seems to subtly mock Daisy and Americans like her who do not "understand" the nuances of European life. So it confused me that when she finally seems to be seeking out what she lacks, James kills her. One more example of the "damned if you do, damned if you don't" nature of Daisy's short life. Perhaps James implies that Daisy was not seeking out the Colosseum for the right reasons; instead of wanting to gain intellectual knowledge or absorb the history, she just wants an adventure and that isn't good enough for James and Winterbourne. 

The more I thought about this, the more I thought about the significance of the Colosseum. It was a place of violence and entertainment, which seems to parallel gauche, shallow aspects of America and Daisy herself. However, the Colosseum was also a place where executions took place, particularly those of Christian martyrs. Because it is revealed at the end that Daisy was "innocent" after all, James might not be as judgmental towards Daisy as I thought. He could be comparing her to these innocent victims, and showing the way the cruelty of Winterbourne's world killed Daisy. 

The Mystery of Daisy

As humans, we're always looking to categorize, to type, to classify...We always want things and people to fit into pre-designated categories or types, making it easier for us to understand them. We don't like it when these people and things don't exactly fit into a "box" of some sort. Outliers are confusing.

Daisy Miller in Henry James' eponymous text stands out as one of these types of people we can't completely figure out. Daisy possesses an inherent complexity that troubles and intrigues us as readers. While Daisy appears extremely innocent and naïve on the surface, her conduct and manners speak otherwise; in the words of Winterbourne, Daisy is "very charming, but how deucedly sociable!" (James 10). We, along with Winterbourne, can't decide whether we like or dislike Daisy. Especially when she passes suddenly at the end of the story, we don't know whether to condemn her as a girl who paid the price for her pride, ignorance, and lack of decorum, or if she was indeed a naïve girl who was tragically misguided and confused?

I think it's important for us to relish this confusion and ambiguity a bit. It's far more interesting for us to explore various interpretations of Daisy and her storyline and to contemplate James' potential disparate intentions rather than to be frustrated with our not being able to categorize her in one way or another. Part of the beauty of this James piece is in how it gets us thinking about both Daisy and Winterbourne's characters (since Winterbourne is the lens through which we see and evaluate Daisy) in different ways.

Scotch

I was intrigued by Onno's comparison of Henry James to scotch in class, and I have to confess that upon first reading of Daisy Miller I do not like the taste (for now)! As Onno said, it seems to represent "everything I hate": portentousness and richness and overabundant luxury, it seemed to me to lack any real substance. I found myself asking, why is this meaningful? What makes this Literature with a capital L?

I kept asking these questions all the way up to the end and I'm still asking them. For me, the ending is the most interesting part. What has been up to this point a story seemingly to be only about a man chasing around "an American flirt" suddenly has become very meaningful. One would think that a shallow romance novel would end with a marriage, or some kind of drama where Daisy rejects Giovanelli and announces her love for Winterbourne, but it doesn't. Instead it ends with Daisy dying and life going "back to normal" for Winterbourne - which is at once bewildering and interesting.

Clues throughout the novel hint that James may be trying to get at something deeper. In an early description of Daisy, James says almost sarcastically "She had ever so many intimate friends that had been there ever so many times. And then she had ever so many dresses and things from Paris. Whenever she put on a Paris dress she felt as if she were in Europe" (11, Kindle Edition). She is also clearly enamored with "society" and gentleman giving her dinners. "Last winter I had seventeen dinners given me; and three of them were by gentleman" (12).

In a typical romance novel, one would think that this would simply be the climate. Gentleman giving dinners and the woman having to decide on the most gentlemanly gentleman who can win her heart (this is perhaps a stereotype, and reveals my apathy towards romance novels). But by having Daisy so obviously enamored by dinners and gentleman and society James is trying to critique that kind of "society". Ultimately it is Daisy's love of society that kills her, as she frolics in it deeper and deeper with Giovanelli, and it is revealed that her relationship with him was very shallow. Could this be evidence of Jame's critique?

The Character of Giovanelli

Daisy and Winterbourne are definitely the most intriguing characters in Daisy Miller; however, I also developed a profound interest in Mr. Giovanelli by the end of the novella. The narrator really reveals nothing regarding the substance of his and Daisy's relationship, only what other Americans in Rome think of it. Daisy describes him as "'a great friend of mine,'" and as "'tremendously clever." He apparently is not clever enough to recognize the audacity and individualism in Daisy's character though. I thought it was incredibly poignant that by the end of the novel Giovonelli proclaims Daisy as "'the most innocent'" shortly after Winterbourne comes to the conclusion that her abnormal behavior actually stems from an inherent audacity and disregard for societal expectations. The narrator articulates Winterbourne's epiphany as "she was a young lady whom a young gentleman need no longer be at pains to respect" (p. 48). He proceeds to say of Daisy "what a clever little reprobate she was, and how smartly she played an injured innocence" (p. 48).  But Giovanelli, who spends enormously more time with Daisy than Winterbourne does, seems completely oblivious to her true personality, her true recklessness and clever self-awareness. James conceals such a large portion of Daisy and Giovenlli's relationship that it's completely unclear how Giovanelli misinterprets her personality. I think Daisy's character is so interesting because so many people misinterpret who she actually is, and Giovanelli does this very explicitly. He sees her clever rebelliousness as innocence.

Upgraded and Style and Content in "Beast"?

I don’t know how many times I had to read the first sentence of “The Beast in the Jungle.” It seemed unnecessarily complex, and also, upon second glance, almost meaningless: “What determined the speech that startled him in the course of their encounter scarcely matters, being probably but some words spoken by himself quite without intention– spoken as they lingered and slowly moved together after their renewal of acquaintance” (303). So, essentially, James is telling us that Marcher said something that doesn’t matter, for little reason, to a woman he already knows? Why begin a story with a sentence that disregards the main character’s words and motive as unimportant?

The contrast in style between “Daisy Miller” and “The Beast in the Jungle” therefore becomes clear right away– as it simultaneously disorients the reader. What’s perhaps even more frustrating is that “Beast” (at least through the first three chapters) seems at first to concern something far more trivial than “Daisy Miller.” The latter tells the tale of a mysterious young woman and her admirer flitting around Europe; there’s scandal and romance and death. The former is about a man who claims that he has a bad feeling that something’s going to happen, and the first half, at least, describes a friendship built singularly on waiting for that bad thing to occur. The convoluted writing builds up something that, to me, seems a little ridiculous. I really would like Marcher to stop feeling sorry for himself.

On the other hand, if you can get past the slight absurdity of Marcher’s issue, it does seem like “Beast” addresses something more profound than “Daisy Miller.” It tackles some unknown enemy, and a sense of the foreboding– things that could grow to some universal truth by the end of the story. Whereas Daisy Miller is a portrait of a innocent American girl not yet ready for high European society.

I suppose I’m curious about two things: whether the suddenly elevated style in “Beast” brings something substantial to the story that was lacking in “Daisy Miller”; and also if the supposed maturation of writing style mirrors a maturation in content. Having only read half of “The Beast in the Jungle,” it’s certainly too soon to tell, but I hope the answer to both is “yes.” It would be unfortunate if the growth accrued over the course of all or part of a career in writing brought nothing new to the table. Given that James is such a celebrated author, I’d guess I won’t be disappointed.