贵妇画像

The International Theme
• The meeting of America and Europe, American innocence in contract and contrast European decadence, and its moral and psychological complications.
Main Characters
• Being young and desirable, like most of James's heroines she gets much of her education from being loved • by the too aggressive Bostonian Caspar Goodwood, by the healthy, manly Lord Warburton, • by her cousin Ralph Touchett, • and by the dilettante艺术爱好者 Gilbert Osmond.
• Psychological realism: • “The house of fiction has not one window but a million” and at each of these windows hanging over the human scene “stands a figure with a pair of eyes... He and his neighbors are watching the same show, but one seeing more where the other sees less, one seeing black where the other sees white, one seeing big where the other sees small, one seeing coarse where the other sees fine. ‘fortunately’ by reason, precisely, of this incalculability of range.”
Main Characters
• GILBERT OSMOND • “no career，no name，no position，no fortune，no past, no future ，no anything.” A cruel, narcissistic gentleman of no particular social standing or wealth, who seduces Isabel and marries her for her money. An art collector, Osmond poses as a disinterested aesthete, but in reality he is desperate for the recognition and admiration of those around him. He treats everyone who loves him as simply an object to be used to fulfill his desires; he bases his daughter Pansy's upbringing on the idea that she should be unswervingly subservient to him, and he even treats his longtime lover Madame Merle as a mere tool.
Main Characters
• ISABEL ARCHER The novel’s protagonist. Isabel's experiences in Europe—she is wooed by an English lord, inherits a fortune, and falls prey to a villainous scheme to marry her to the sinister Gilbert Osmond—force her to confront the conflict between her desire for personal independence and her commitment to social propriety. • Isabel is the main focus of The Portrait of a Lady, and most of the thematic exploration of the novel occurs through her actions, thoughts, and experiences. • Ultimately, Isabel chooses to remain in her miserable marriage to Osmond rather than to violate custom by leaving him and searching for a happier life.
Catalogue
Plot summary Main Characters Theme Writing Styles
Plot Summary
• Isabel Archer is a woman in her early twenties who comes from a genteel(上流社会的)family in Albany, New York, in the late 1860s. Her mother died when she was a young girl, and her father raised her up. • Shortly after Isabel’s father dies, she visited her aunt.
The Portrait of a Lady
-----Henry James
The Portrait of a Lady
• It is one of James' most popular long novels, and is regarded by critics as one of his finest . • With rich, well-structured, and the psychological portrait of young women , this novel was regarded as modern novel of America.
Plot Summary
• Isabel travels to Florence with Mrs. Touchett and Madame Merle; Merle introduces Isabel to a man named Gilbert Osmond, a man of no social standing or wealth, but whom Merle describes as one of the finest gentlemen in Europe, wholly devoted to art and aesthetics.
Plot Summary
• The most important part of the book is where she realizes her mistake. After Ralph’s death, Isabel struggles to decide whether to return to her husband or not. Her independent spirit urges her to flee from Osmond and find happiness elsewhere. Caspar Goodwood appears at the funeral, and afterwards, he asks Isabel to run away with him and forget about her husband. • The next day, Isabel returned to Rome, unable to break away from her marriage to Gilbert Osmond.
Main Characters
• MR. TOUCHETT, an American who has lived in England for many years, head of a banking house inLondon. • MRS. TOUCHETT, his wife. • RALPH TOUCHETT, attempting to manipulate Isabel into marrying Osmond so that he will have access to her fortune. Osmond is pleased to marry Isabel, not only for her money, but also because she makes a fine addiction to his collection of art objects. After many good offers of marriage, she chooses the wrong man.
Writing Styles
• Point of view of a character: Isabel Archer’s consciousness and perception promote the plot. • 这部小说中作者第一次冲破了传统小说的写作方 式，以女主人公伊莎贝尔·阿切尔为意识中心，将 各种不同的观点集于一身，以她的视角去体验现 实生活、感悟人生的真谛。作者精微细致地描绘 了伊莎贝尔对周围环境与人物的各种内心感受与 心理变化，使外部世界通过人物的内心活动得到 充分表现，使故事情节在人物的内心活动中自然 展开，从伊莎贝尔的人生经历中读者看到她自由 独立的性格 。