The most compelling part of the book for me was experiencing the life of someone with a sensible (the definition with respect to responsiveness & acute perception, not the more common one one associated with being rational), shy, and introverted (if this word even means anything) personality. James's writing captures what goes on 'behind-the-scenes', so to speak, in the mind as he describes the flood of emotions that govern each little moment of time, each small gesture or passing remark. It's a tremendous feat that gives 'the other side' besides the external of those that seem timid, uncertain and/or withdrawn in social situations. Perhaps you might see someone nervously fidget, or, after being silent in a group for a large part of the conversation, make an apprehensive comment with a slight stutter. This, unfortunately, usually causes those to overlook the person due to human nature's natural interest in outspokenness and confidence. So the story of the introvert, and along with it the overwhelming cascades of thoughts, long-winding avenues of insight and inquiry, and beautifully constructed edifices of imagination is often buried alongside its holder. But James, in perhaps a heroic sense, breaks this cycle and puts down on paper what life is like for those with a more internal psyche.

His late novels can serve almost as an abbreviated reference, at least for me, for the psychological responses I have in both social situations and, more generally, life itself. I've found myself at some passages completely absorbed in the novel because it's exactly and oddly relatable. Other times I'm utterly lost as he expounds for several pages on an avenue of thought I just can't parse (though James makes some things intentionally difficult to understand). But all in all, it's a fascinating book that requires an intense amount of concentration and time to get through. The effort is multiplied not just by James's brilliant writing style and the inherent complexity of stepping outside oneself to view life from another perspective, but also because the man himself (Lambert Strether), as I've described above, is almost too perceptive, capricious, and timorous. This, along with the interior access unlocked by James's style (among other things) uniquely establishes The Ambassadors as a personal favorite, and a literary classic.

Henry James has taken circumlocution and obfuscation to new heights in this novel. I don’t often rate a book an ungenerous two stars, but this novel was in many ways an impossible book for me. I appreciate the architecture of James’s novel: the beauty of Paris as a backdrop for temporarily exiled Americans to meet and discover, or not, the underlying theme: ‘knowing how to live’. But I never felt the intended drama, or the sudden discovery of self, partly because I nearly drowned in James’s nebulous, impenetrable sentences which, while exuding a certain beauty, often defied understanding.

Lambert Strether goes to Paris on behalf of Mrs. Newsome, who wants her son back in the fold in New England. Strether finds Chad Newsome in Paris, and he is, they all say, an altered man. He has discovered the moveable feast that the man of simpler prose called this great venue, and Strether feels a bit lost. Until he begins to feel the pull of Paris as well, and of the women residing there. This is basically the story. Will Chad go back? Will Strether? What will Mrs. Newsome do? What about Madame de Vionnet, the older French temptress, and the exiled American, Miss Gostrey, who is clearly interested in Strether?

I value beautiful prose and don’t always believe in the simplicity of language that writers like Hemingway and King, albeit very different writers, are proponents of. However, there were convoluted sentences with embedded clauses, which had me going back to disentangle them to make any sense of the story. The writing, at times, seemed willfully obscure. Then there is the idiosyncratic placement of adverbs as well as an immense accumulation of adverbs, both in the novel as a whole and on sentence level, which I’m sorry to say simply annoyed me. To wit:

She immensely wants herself to see our friend’s cousin.

(…) that she would really perhaps after all have heard (…)

He had had, vaguely, his view of the probability of her wishing to set something right, to deal in some way with the fraud so lately practiced on his presumed credibility.

He perceived soon enough at least that, however reasonable she might be, she wasn’t vulgarly confused, and it herewith pressed upon him that their eminent ‘lie’, Chad’s and hers, was simply after all such an inevitable tribute to good taste as he couldn’t have wished them not to render.

And conversations in which people said things like:

’Is she that deep?’

‘Yes, I believe that she is.’

On which someone typically ponders thus:

He thought about it serenely.

Interestingly, the novel was Henry James’s own favourite. It is clearly the work of his mature period, and I can only say that I prefer him, then, at his more immature. This was the third time I approached the novel. I had seen the mixed ratings among my GR friends (from 2 to 5 stars) but approached the novel, seeing – as claimed on GR – that Forster had appreciated it. Well, someone has misread Forster. In his  Aspects of the Novel, Forster says of this novel that James pursued the narrow path of aesthetic beauty (…) but at what sacrifice! Forster goes on to say that the characters are stingily constructed, show no carnality, have limited sensations and that James’s rigid plotting shuts the doors on life. This perhaps goes some way to explaining why I never felt the drama that the characters talk about.

Reading the novel was a stubborn struggle to me, and the only thing that comforted me in my inability to appreciate it more was that a much missed friend here on GR, whose literary judgment I completely trusted and usually agreed with, had also rated it two stars. (I checked this when I began reading the novel the first time, at which time he was still here).

So while I want to applaud James’s total and utter disbelief in more modern advice (though Hemingway was around the corner) to leave out anything superfluous and to deliberately go for the overwritten style, the story was lost to me in the fogs of oblique language rather than rendered crucial via clear and vibrant language. But it is a preference, and as Zadie Smith writes in her chapter about Forster in her essay collection: His own preference for simplicity he recognized for what it was, a preference, linked to a dream of mass connection. So I hope I do not deter anyone from reading this, but you might arm yourself with patience. Nor am I done with Henry James, but it’ll be his younger, briefer self I approach next time.

Henry James and I have what might best be termed as a slightly troubled relationship. I adore The Portrait of a Lady, having read it with pleasure several times, but struggle (not literally, but metaphorically) with his intensely self-centered characters in his later works, The Golden Bowl and The Wings of the Dove. Perhaps now is just not my time for the latter two. Whatever the case may be, I fail to comprehend how an author as life-affirming as the Henry James who wrote The Ambassadors could have penned novels such as the aforementioned two that, along with Ambassadors, make up the triad of his late literary canon. I finished Ambassadors about a couple of weeks ago, and just the other night realized that it has entered the ranks of my favorite books and is adamantly demanding a reread in the not too distant future. It is about living fully, about the beauty of life, about compassion, about realizing and transcending the limitations of one's preconceived notions, about, as James would say, the reader's "coming out" alongside Strether, guided by the inimitable and wonderful Miss Gostrey. The way James probes the depths of his characters' conscious and unconscious processes, revealing untold fathoms to his readers as well, is uncanny, reminding us that we exist in swirling whirlpools of consciousness that, if we permit them, will pull us to life's center in order to engage with it and with those with whom we share it directly and compassionately. To transcend the self through exploring the hidden recesses of the self--this is Strether's noble and witty journey, and I am grateful to have accompanied him.

A word of suggestion--I found the prose to penetrate more thoroughly and become more accessible when I allowed myself to succumb to it, so to speak. Approaching it in a purely cerebral and analytical manner can be akin to shoving one's head against a brick wall. Surrendering to its ebb and flow, on the other hand, accepting its obscurity at times, allows it to settle within the mind and become clear as one moves on. Even now, the more spaciousness I can cultivate, the more I still feel this book settling within me. It's a delightful, beautiful read!

I swam in the extraordinary wordplay of this book and almost drowned at times. Swmming, floating, sinking are metaphors that James uses throughout, the big question being, are you going to let yourself float in the atmosphere of culture, art and sophistication of Paris, or are you going to resist it, in favour of something more banale (like making money in Woollett, the imagined town in the US which many of the characters come from).

Initially I found this experience wonderful. But by the end I tired. The problem is that I find James' writing devoid of passion. He is so involved in constructing, word by word, an incredibly elaborate artifice, he forgets to invest his story with any love. Strether is admittedly a compelling character (one I empathised with in fact). But what about the others? The whole story revolves around the fact that Chad has become a "wonderful" person, from being a less than impressive one in Woollett, apparently, under the influence of the even more "wonderful" Madame de Vionnet. But I don't believe it. I don't feel it. Chad just stands there, looking patrician and self-assured, with his streak of grey hair belying his young age and giving the impression of quiet wisdom. All I have is Strether's repeated claims of how wonderful he is.

Give me Portrait of a Lady any time. Perhaps James was young enough at that time to still love people (maybe accepting 107 party invitations over one winter didn't help). Not only Isabel, but also Osmond, Madame Merle, and Ralph are wonderfully imagined, fully invested with humanity.

Awesome! Marvelous prose in third person narrative of the protagonist, sent to Paris by his dominating fiancée to bring back her presumable errant son, with unexpected consequences. Excellent storyline, full of suspense. Large cast, great character studies. It has been called a "dark comedy," an that it is with a vengeance. I'm not happy about the ending though, but then that's me as a transplanted European ...

My warning: Not an easy read! It took me two weeks.

My advise: Read the Preface *after* you have read the novel.

The novel is also available online, http://www2.newpaltz.edu/~hathawar/am....

I found some obscure article (forgive me, I can't remember where) that stated James wanted the reader to only read five pages of "The Ambassadors" at a time. That's what I did and it took an eternity.
The language is rich, maybe too rich, too aware of its richness, too well-chosen to be a true stream-of-counsciousness, but nevertheless I did have to look up a word or two and notate them down to reuse myself later.

Our friend Strether is the picture of the 20th century American upper class male, even his thoughts are dominated by propriety, the social order, what is 'good' and what 'ought' to be. He is torn between obligation and his intuitive inclination toward the pleasures that Paris has to offer. The minutiae of social interaction is scurtinized to the point of meaninglessness in Strether's mind. Maybe that was James' point, but I can't get over the notion that the whole thing is showing off. The author's 5-page-at-a-time advice is further evidence of a superiority complex that, of course, would find the little thoughts of an upper class gentleman interesting enough to fill hundreds of pages with them. Strether himself, as likeable as he is written, is a hypocrite. He needs assurance of Chad's "goodness," so that he can give a convincing report of "all's well" to the young man's mother. Yet, Strether himself is living the high life in Paris on the mother's dime, a widow Strether hopes to marry. Strether was compelled to take this trip out of duty to "his beloved" on her money and save Chad from the latent degeneracy of grand Paris: I mean people drink coffee at night, sit outside of the cafes, and appreciate the artist, it is a place that is sure to corrupt. Strether's associates: Waymarsh and Miss Gostrey, act as his shoulder angel and devil respectively. The dialogue between Miss Gostrey and Strether is tedious. If I were to update it to the modern voice: "What do you think?" "I don't know what do YOU think?" "Do you mean to say I should think?" "Why, of course, that is, if thought is 'good'" "Ah ha, now I see your meaning."
I don't exaggerate with the 'YOU' that's in there. The all caps emphasis on subject HE, SHE, YOU, HIS, etc. seems to suggest some sort of social tennis match played in pairs where each player has to shout who the receiver will be before the ball is struck.

In the end: James claimed this was his best book, it was also his last book. You will learn nothing about 20th century Paris. In fact, the title itself "The Ambassadors" seems to suggest that us traveling Americans are so self-involved that we notice nothing about the country we're visiting, except that to give into it would be defeat. On the other hand, you will feel like you accomplished something, if you make it through, similar to what it feels like to complete "Ulysses" and secretly hate James Joyce (but tell all your friends it is genius, because if you don't you'll appear less intelligent). You may also increase your vocabulary and the understanding of the complexity of the English language, perhaps.

Catching up with the classics # 20

I️ am not a fan, but I️ WILL finish

I hate this book. I'm never going to finish this

For god sake! I read this entire book with the main male character, Strether, making everything his business, for him only at the end to say that that none of it his his business. WTH was this book about then, James?????

You must have been paid by the prepositional phrase! And had no editor to tell you that most of your novel was extraneous. I finally threw up my hands when you wrote the "want to want to" conversation. REALLY?!?!?

I took the time to read this and that is how it fucking ends???? Really, Strether?!?! What a dude!

This book was an unfortunate first read of Henry James.

I was impressed by his elegent prose, his literary techniques like the way he wrote the dialouge, how the writer/narrator came in to the story. "our friend Mr Strether" here and there. I could appreciate intelligently what what he was doing technically but his storytelling in this novel didnt work for me. The surface story was weak to me and the themes,ideas he wrote about have been done better.
Its a novel imho that haven't dated nearly as well as other classics from the same period i have read. His characters are not nearly as interesting as they must be in a novel like this. The main character Mr. Strether must be more compelling since much of the novel depends on how he is written. So overall i was disappointed because i expected better. There are many strong classic 1860-1920 authors that have to compete for my reading time.

I wont judge this writer by a late period book that is maybe more important to literary scholars than regular readers,critics. I will read Turn of the Screw and give Mr.James a chance impress me more because i liked his prose enough.

I don't give four star reviews lightly. Usually, when I give it that rating, I'm saying, "Hey, whoever happens to see this review, you should read this!"

But... I don't know if that's what I'm trying to say with The Ambassadors. I think you should read it? Maybe? To be honest, I'm not sure why I read it and, now that it's over, I'm not sure what exactly to think of it. And, yet, I know this was a fantastic book. It's undeniably a work of high art meticulously crafted by a master. If you feel confused by what I'm saying, I promise, it's nothing compared to how confused I feel.

I read this book during a "digital declutter" which basically means I was trying to spend as much time away from screens as possible. Unfortunately for me, my dictionary is most often the internet and I didn't know at least 1/3 of the words James used. I tried to make it with context clues and my scant knowledge of prefixes and suffixes, but, after just 15 pages, I tired out. I literally bought a dictionary just to comprehend this book.

And I still don't know that I did. The words I got, but the storyline? Here's how I'll say it -- I know what I think the story was about, but, if you were to read it and we were to talk about it, I wouldn't be surprised at all if we had totally different conceptions of the novel.

It sounds like I hate this book, so let me praise its art for a moment: I don't know that I've ever, I mean truly ever, read sentences as beautifully crafted as James'. Maybe Shakespeare beats him out, but besides that...I had to stop and read some out loud just to feel them more closely. The sounds and rhythms and paths of his words were mesmerizing. I had to re-read a lot in this book (because, like I said, I was reading way above my pay grade), but I came to enjoy it simply because I paid more attention to his syntax and word choices.

So I guess the point is - read this, or don't read this, but, if you do, take your time and consider buying a dictionary.

"His life, his life! — Strether paused anew, on the last flight, at this final rather breathless sense of what Chad’s life was doing with Chad’s mother’s emissary. It was dragging him, at strange hours, up the staircases of the rich; it was keeping him out of bed at the end of long hot days; it was transforming beyond recognition the simple, subtle, conveniently uniform thing that had anciently passed with him for a life of his own."

My main issue with this novel is how psychological it is; simply put, James makes 500+ pages out of a molehill  (or so it seems for a large part of the novel), and expects us to enjoy protagonist's constant self-examination. At some point I even resorted to frantic googling to make sure no nuances of the situation, obvious to the characters, eluded me (as far as I can tell, none did).

I can grasp the concept - the book's thin plot being an excuse for presenting Strether's quiet drama, as he discovers, late in life (how old is he, by the way? probably in his fifties) that he prefers the Old World charm, understatedness, and sophistication to the New World's black and white perception of the world (at some point, he compares his Massachusetts fiancee to an iceberg).

“That, you see, is my only logic. Not, out of the whole affair, to have got anything for myself.”

Finally, Strether makes a decision that will cost him a safe and affluent future, is disappointed in people whose lifestyle he chose to defend, and even rejects love and companionship of his charming female sidekick.

Still, if not for the fact that Strether had me at 'hello', and that the writing was superb, I think I could have abandoned this book. After a very good beginning, I did not care what would happen next for much of the second part of the novel, and kept reading only because I couldn't stop, and was rewarded; the last book is exquisite.

A piece of Woolett trivia:
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_an...

I just spent a review trying to figure out why I didn't like a book that was very similar to a "classic." It was kind of a relief to go from that to this book, which is undeniably by someone who is literary and wrote classics, and to be able to say that I really enjoyed The Ambassadors quite a lot. I think I enjoyed it more then A Portrait of a Lady, which had some aspects that grated on me. Phew! I'm not an entire Philistine, after all!

Note: The rest of this review has been withheld due to the changes in Goodreads policy and enforcement. You can read why I came to this decision here.

In the meantime, you can read the entire review at Smorgasbook

I get irritated by reviewers who give good books bad reviews because it 'isn't the kind of book I like/expected'. So I have given it four stars as a rating of what it tries to do. I just don't think you have to be that obscure and hyper-exquisite to be effective. I don't think every one of the characters would have spoken in such a murky style, at least not in every conversation. I do think James achieves a subtle representation of Strether's passage through naivite, blossoming, rebellion, heroism, semi-disillusionment, and a second rear battle to make his sacrifice worthwhile.