Francesca Cricchio
Journal for James
English 48B
February 14, 2011
“He felt very sorry for her- not exactly that he believed that she had completely lost her head, but because it was painful to hear so much that was pretty and undefended and natural assigned to a vulgar place among the categories of disorder” (423).
“The concept of a good or bad novel is judged solely upon whether the author is good or bad. His imaginative use of point of view, interior monologue and possibly unreliable narrators in his own novels and tales brought a new depth and interest to narrative fiction.” (Biography of Henry James from Wikipedia).
Daisy Miller begins in Vevey, Switzerland where Winterbourne is found enjoying a meal outside and becomes acquainted with Daisy Miller (real name Annie P. Miller). She was “admirably pretty” (393) in Winterbourne’s eyes and he immediately takes a liking to her. They talk amongst one another, and at first Daisy does not pay much attention to him. “She looked another way when he spoke to her, and seemed not particularly to hear him, this was simply her habit, her manner” (394). After spending more time together they begin to get along and decide to travel the Chillon Castle together, unchaperoned. All goes well until Winterbourne informs Daisy that he will have to head back to Geneva in a day or two. She jokingly argues with him and calls him “horrid”. They head back to town, and do not meet again until winter time in Rome, Italy.
By this time Winterbourne’s aunt has been living in Rome for some time and has been able to observe and talk with others about the reputation of the Miller’s (Daisy, Randolph, and Mrs. Miller). She states that Daisy has been going out at all times of the night with different men. Winterbourne goes to meet Mrs. Walker, and runs in to Daisy in the process. They talk with Mrs. Walker about an event that Mrs. Walker has planned in a few days, and Daisy asks if she can bring “Mr. Giovanelli”. Mrs. Walker adamantly agrees even though she (or her group of upper-class friends) know nothing about this man. Throughout the rest of the story Daisy is found parading around town at all times of day and night with this new man. Winterbourne spends countless days trying to figure out if Daisy is really as innocent as she looks, or if she is intimate with these men (James never fully confines to one or the other in his writing).
The story concludes with Winterbourne strolling to the Coliseum one moonlit evening to find Daisy and Mr. Giovanelli sitting at the center of the monument at around midnight! Daisy and Mr. Giovanelli quickly scurry off, and about a week later Daisy falls ill (most likely from malaria which was very threatening at the time) and dies.
Henry James had an amazing quality and style to his writing that gave a “limited point of view” (389). The Norton Anthology writes “he became invisible in his work. The benefits of this heightened emphasis on showing rather than telling were compression or intensification and enhanced opportunity for ambiguity” (389). This is entirely what James did in Daisy Miller. The character Daisy is never actually explained through the narrators eyes, but through the eyes of Winterbourne. By doing this we don’t have a pull towards one opinion because we look through the eyes of a character, not the author. His ambiguous writing game me the opportunity to not judge Daisy right off the bat because her definition and description was never fully explained. Because of the way James wrote this story, I was literally captivated until the very end of the story. I could not put the book down, because it was through the story that I figured out who Daisy truly was, and I couldn’t figure her out until the end because no set character description was written about her. Through her actions and the things she said, I discovered that she was just a naive and innocent girl who was honestly “uncultivated” in terms of upper-class European society.
