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Summing up his childhood, Henry James remarked, “We wholesomely breathed inconsistency and ate and drank contradictions” (Edel, 1953, p. 47). The paradoxical use of the word “wholesome” cannot be understood as a simple, direct approbation of the perversely ambiguous world of his childhood. The inconsistency he breathed and the contradictions he ate and drank became wholesome through the unique uses he put them to in the creation of his personal style and in the changing styles of his work. My premises are:
Henry James became the unique individual he was as a result of responding to adversity by a series of developmental choices. These choices involved, first, a remarkable progression in the line of development of narcissism; second, a relative regression in the line of development that leads through well-differentiated separation and individuation to mature sexual and aggressive
This paper is the outcome of a three-year seminar study of the life, works, and style of Henry James. The conclusions represent contributions made by each of the members. It is proper, therefore, to express my gratitude to each of them, and of us all to Leon Edel and to the Master, Henry James.
The material from Henry James: The Untried Years (1843-1870), Vol. 1, by Leon Edel (New York: J. B. Lippincott), Copyright 1953, by Leon Edel, is reprinted by permission of Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc.
functioning; third, a great vulnerability in the line of development of cohesiveness of the body self because of a back-and-forth pull between progressive and regressive tendencies.
As an adult artist, his responses to adversity involved regression, often severe, from which he would rebound by a progressive thrust into an increasingly mature creative output.
In mid-life he responded to his most severe adversity by a creative rebound that not only resulted in a progressive thrust in creative output, but in a remarkable creation of a major stylistic revision. In each movement forward, Henry James us