Author, Author (novel)
LC Class | PR6062.O36 A95 2004 |
Author, Author is a novel by David Lodge, written in 2004. The book is based on the life of the author Henry James. It was released at about the same time as The Master by Colm Tóibín and other books about James, and Lodge wrote The Year of Henry James: The Story of a Novel about this. Lodge populates his novel with several of the most famous figures of English literature from the time of the book's setting in the late nineteenth century.
Plot summary
The novel opens with a
Now we proceed back in time to the middle years of James' life and are introduced to a large and interesting group of James' literary acquaintances from his period of expatriation in England. Among those we meet are
Meanwhile, James is writing prolifically himself with little comparable financial or critical success. We are given a long and funny account of James' humiliating quest to write a popular play for the London stage. There is an ironic and entertaining distance set up here between James' feelings of failure and inadequacy and what we now know about his final reputation. While du Maurier and Trilby have all but faded from the public view, James' body of work has continued to attract readers worldwide and his position as one of the most important figures in literature is now secure. In this sense, the novel can be seen as both an homage and as an artistic attempt to rescue the historical James from his own feeling of obscurity.
The book also includes a portrait of the friendship that James formed during this time with the American author Constance Fenimore Woolson. Lodge suggests that their relationship had a romantic (but unconsummated) dimension. As in real life, Woolson commits suicide while traveling in Italy and this leads James to wonder what connection, if any, there might have been between her death and her feelings for him. Lodge's depiction of their relationship allows him subtly to explore James' alleged lifelong virginity and to conjecture somewhat about his notorious prudishness.
Editions
- ISBN 0-670-03349-9(USA).
- ISBN 0-14-101822-4(United Kingdom).