Ethics between two worlds: The moral significance of Italian places in Henry James’s literature

Abstract

This article questions the ethical profile of some of the characters in Henry James’s literature in relation to concrete life places and situations. It refers first to the Diary of a Man of Fifty, because this short tale anticipates the themes that would dominate James's later works. It focuses in particular on Portrait of a Lady, not without mentioning Daisy Miller, because the descriptions of Italy in those pages help to flesh out the themes that the article wishes to highlight: the encounter between America and Europe (Italy in particular, with Florence and Rome), and the way circumstances determine the moral development of James’s characters. Self-consciousness through conflict with the surrounding world is one of the most vivid topics in James's literature. The personal condition of those who left the USA to settle in Europe became the subject of many of his novels, with all the baggage of incomplete experiences, anxieties and the pain of an integration never fully realized.