The transfigured niece

[Gladys]

Here's a fine subtlety I missed!

Just before the intrusive critic learns of the cremation of the great poet's papers, he sees in the niece a reflection of the aunt's dazzling eyes, a relic of her one-time attractiveness to Jeffrey Aspern himself. Amazingly, the critic muses for a moment that he could even marry the niece, finally freed from her aunt's governance. But he directly learns his instinctive spurning of the niece has lost him more than his treasured papers.

He realises that, in alienating the niece, he may have spurned something of a radiance that once inspired the poet. All that’s left is to offer her a parting tribute: money for the Aspern miniature the critic demurred to sell.

[Jozanny]

Gladys: It has been a while since I've tackled The Aspern Papers, but unlike The Ambassadors, the novella did not elude me, although I am not sure how I feel about the erstwhile scholar's signature moment with the aging niece. I have read a theory that this tale is so strange because James was enamored of Pushkin, and plotted Aspern as a tribute to the poet.

I cannot say yea or nay, however, because I have only a cursory familiarity with the Russian poet to end them all. Aspern, like some others, is one of my most admired constructs by James. He gets all the pieces to fall into place, and his diction does not baffle intent.

[Gladys]

Jozanny: The Aspern Papers the best James' novella I've read - beautifully written.

I made sufficient sense of The Ambassadors but The Awkward Age, written just before, is a stream of consciousness nightmare that took forever to read.