The dstinctive heroine in The Portrait of a Lady.docVIP

The distinctive heroine in The Portrait of a Lady Abstract: Henry James is a great master of world literature in the 19th century, and The Portrait of a Lady is one of his most popular novels in which the heroine Isabel’s pursue for freedom makes a deep impression on reader’s mind. Key words: Henry James, The Portrait of a Lady, freedom , independence The Portrait of a Lady which is one of the most famous long novels of Henry James exhibits an American girl’s growth after she ships to England to live with his wealthy uncle. Henry James made this fiction distinguished by the exquisite description in the complexities of the psyche of his characters especially the psychological analysis over his heroine ---Isabel Archer. Henry James was born on 15 April 1843 in New York City, New York State, United States, the second of five children born to theologian Henry James Sr. who was one of the most wealthy intellectuals of the time, connected with noted philosophers and transcendentalists as Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau and so on, and those fellow friends and influential thinkers of the time had a profound effect on his children’s life, what we can see from the status of his sisters and brothers, such as the brother of philosopher and psychologist----William James and diarist Alice James. Also education was of the utmost importance to Henry Sr. and the family spent many years in Europe and the major cities of England, Italy, Switzerland, France, and Germany, his children being tutored in languages and literature. Henry James was deeply influenced by these European trips and got great interest in the European culture and literature, so after a briefly studying in Harvard Law School he devoted himself to literature and read many classics of literature voraciously, and started his career with short stories, he contributed to many magazines such as The Nation and Atlantic Monthly and the latter was also the place where his first novel Watch and Ward was serialized.