The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II)
1886
Henry James turns his merciless eye on the American obsession with reform in this sparkling satire of the women's rights movement. At its center is abattle for the soul of Verena Tarrant, a young speaker of extraordinary beauty and vagueness, whose gift for inspirational oratory has made her the prize in a struggle between two cousins: Olive Chancellor, a wealthy Boston radical who has dedicated her life to the cause, and Basil Ransom, a brooding Southern lawyer who represents everything she despises. James understands that ideology and desire are not so easily separated. Olive's passion for Verena is genuine, but is it love or possession? Ransom's conservatism masks a romanticism that is as dangerous as any feminism. The novel asks uncomfortable questions about what women really want, and whether the people who claim to champion them might also be the ones who cage them. Sharp, witty, and psychologically intricate, The Bostonians remains startlingly relevant for anyone who has ever wondered whether liberation can also be a form of control.
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“Wherever you go, madam, it will matter little what you carry. You will always carry your goodness.””
— Henry James
“She had never yet encountered a personage so exotic, and she always felt more at ease in the presence of anything strange. It was the usual things of life that filled her with silent rage; which was natural enough inasmuch as, to her vision, almost everything that was usual was inqiuitous.””
— Henry James
“Miss Chancellor would have been much happier if the movements she was interested in could have been carried on only by people she liked,and if revolutions, somehow, didn't always have to begin with one's self--with internal convulsions,sacrifices,executions.””
— Henry James
“Basil Ransom had got up just as Mrs. Luna made this last declaration; for a young lady had glided into the room, who stopped short as it fell upon her ears. She stood there looking, consciously and rather seriously, at Mr. Ransom; a smile of exceeding faintness played about her lips--it was just perceptible enough to light up the native gravity of her face. It might have been likened to a thin ray of moonlight resting upon the wall of a prison.””
— Henry James
“I was on the point of saying that a happy chance had favoured him, but it occurs to me that one is under no obligation to call chances by flattering epithets when they have been waited for so long.””
— Henry James
“tan lejos de ser admirable, al que la muchacha iba a entregarse no fueran aquellas””
— Henry James
“concesión en ese momento de trance visionario que parecía secar y dispersar todas las nieblas y ambigüedades de la vida. Esas horas de lucidez retrospectiva les llegan a todos los seres humanos, por lo menos una vez, cuando interpretan el pasado a la luz del presente, con la razón que surge de los hechos, como señales indicadoras que aparecen en lugares donde nunca antes las habían visto.””
— Henry James
“de los ojos expresivos de Basil Ransom. Amaba, estaba enamorada… lo sentía en cada partícula de su cuerpo. En vez de haber sido constituida por la naturaleza para abrigar ese sentimiento en un grado excesivamente pequeño (cosa que estaba implicada en el meollo de su cruzada, y por eso había ofrecido su renunciación hacía tiempo a Olive) se daba cuenta de que por el contrario había sido creada para amar con la mayor intensidad posible. Se trataba en realidad siempre de la misma pasión; pero el objeto se había vuelto otro. Había creído hasta entonces que en su espíritu había una especie de doble llama, la mitad de la cual se dirigía hacia una amistad íntima con una persona verdaderamente extraordinaria y la otra se dirigía hacia los sufrimientos de las mujeres en general.””
— Henry James
“y fermentaban. Al final había llegado a creer en ellas, y en eso consistía la alteración, la transformación. Habían encendido una luz bajo la cual la muchacha se veía de un modo completamente nuevo y lo extraño era que a ella le gustaba más esa imagen que la que proyectaba, con exagerado encanto, bajo las viejas lámparas de las salas de conferencias.””
— Henry James
