A collection of stories from some of our best-loved writers, inspired by the ideas found in Henry James's notebooks.
Henry James was born in New York in 1843 into a wealthy, eccentric,
brilliant family. In his youth he travelled between Europe and
America, studying in London, Paris, Geneva, Newport, Rhode Island
and Bonn. He half-heartedly studied law at Harvard, which only
confirmed his sense of his vocation- to read and write fiction.
His first novel, Watch and Ward, appeared in 1871 in The Atlantic
Monthly. In 1875 James moved to Europe- Paris, then London, and
later Rye in Sussex. Apart from his twenty completed novels and 112
short stories, James wrote plays, criticism, travel books,
autobiographies - and a huge number of letters. He became a British
citizen in 1915 and died in 1916.
[An] ingenious and entertaining collection... the stories could not
be more varied in tone and approach, from Colm Tóibín’s beautifully
measured “Silence”...to Amit Chaudhuri’s bouncily rhythmical
“Wensleydale”...the individuality of the entries does not preclude
entertainment – there is much playfulness and not a little comedy
here
*Times Literary Supplement*
Wonderful short stories...It is fascinating to see how familiar
writers such as Colm Tóibín, Rose Tremain, Tessa Hadley and Lynn
Truss match their own style to quintessentially Jamesian themes: a
father who isn’t who he appeared to be; a ghostly reminder of past
loss; an affair that never quite caught fire. Each story is
different, but the hand of the master is clearly detectable
throughout, a gentle guide that shapes the telling.
*Irish Times*
In this volume, the appreciation of his unwritten tales by eleven
fine contemporary authors pays handsome dividends
*Sydney Review of Books*
The short story should be a gem of bright, quick, vivid form
*Notebooks*
Henry James is as solitary in the history of the novel as
Shakespeare is in the history of poetry
*Graham Greene*
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