Colm Tóibín essays the waters of fictionalized biographical study in this humane portrait of literary giant Henry James.  Tóibín focuses on the five mid-life years during which James roused himself from the enormously disappointing failure of his play, Guy Domville, on the London stage, but we also learn much about James’s Yankee childhood and European young adulthood.

Brad Hooper wrote in Booklist that what Tóibín has “so boldly, brilliantly and successfully done” is “forge a sympathetic but not mushy imagining of James’s interior life at this crossroads, a picture that renders “the Master” astonishingly lifelike. Toibin gives him ordinary human qualities, such as fear and loneliness and longing, in a shaping and shading process that has not been an easy task, even in the most thoughtful, scrupulously researched biography. Obviously, by Toibin’s illustration, fiction is the best way to achieve such a result, the best approach to infusing this somewhat cold, distant, and removed-from-real-life literary icon with an embracing degree of warmth and humanity. Even the reader who knows little about Henry James or his work can enjoy this marvelously intelligent and engaging novel, which presents not on a silver platter but in tender, opened hands a beautifully nuanced psychological portrait.”

And just for a little added insight into Henry James, we’ll also read James’s novella, Daisy Miller.  First published in 1878, the work brought James, then living in London, his first international success. Like many of James’ early works, it portrays a venturesome American girl in the treacherous waters of European society — a theme that would culminate in his 1881 masterpiece, The Portrait of a Lady.

Have a look at all the material Paula gathered to lead our discussion here.