Protagonist Lewis Lambert Strether agrees to travel to Paris to attempt to convince his fiancée’s wayward son, Chad, to return to the US to run the family business. What he finds in Paris is different than expected. Chad is a pleasant young man who has been positively influenced by his associations with a woman and her daughter. Strether meets the two and comes to enjoy their company. A new set of “ambassadors” is sent by his fiancée when Strether fails to obtain the desired action. Over the course of the story, Strether gradually changes his point of view, which in turn, changes what he values in life.

“His greatest uneasiness seemed to peep at him out of the imminent impression that almost any acceptance of Paris might give one’s authority away. It hung before him this morning, the vast bright Babylon, like some huge iridescent object, a jewel brilliant and hard, in which parts were not to be discriminated nor difference comfortably marked. It twinkled and trembled and melted together, and what seemed all surface one moment seemed all depth the next.”

Published in 1903, it was originally written as a serial in the North American Review. I think I may have appreciated it more if I had read it in its original form. As a novel, the primary drawback is that it does not flow very well, and there are many lengthy circuitous sentences. I did not enjoy it quite as much as James’s Portrait of a Lady, which I recommend reading ahead of this one, but overall, I enjoyed it and found it worth my time.

James is a literary savant. He is well read and references Shakespeare and contemporaries such as Zola, Flaubert and Thackery. He is a cosmopolitan blue-blood and a keen observer of human relations.

The result of his unique intellect is a brilliant writing exposition, but also a long and torturous vivisection of human experience with the subtlest and glacially-paced plot movement.

The plot is simple. A wealthy American from Massachusetts, Chad Newsome, has discovered the pleasures of Parisian life and seems unwilling to return to America after 5 years abroad. Rumors have come home to his patrician mother that Chad is involved in a romantic engagement with an unworthy match. She sends her 50-something male companion Strether to bring home her wayward son.

Strether dutifully departs for France and immediately falls under the spell of its capitol city. Strether has lived a passive life with his share of sorrows, but mostly compliant docility. He is entertained by American ex-patriots and discovers Chad matured, happy and healthy.

The rest of the book centers on Strether's exploration of Paris and his reflection on life. Paris has claimed Mrs Newsome's son and now her male confidant. The woman in question in Chad's life is Madame de Vionnet. Madame de Vionnet is 10 years Chad's senior and though estranged from her husband, still married. Strecher, like Chad, is spellbound with the vivacious and alluring woman in question.

Mrs Newsome loses confidence in Strether's ability to extract Chad from Madame de Vionnet and Paris. She sends her daughter Sarah, her son-in-law Jim, and her son-in-law's sister Mamie to take over the mission.

That's it for the plot. The question of whether Chad will stay in Paris or come home is answered as the book winds down. There in not much in the way intrigue or excitement once we discover Chad's decision. The massive narration James sets in front of the reader to get to this conclusion is low on the enjoyment-versus-effort scale.

Why then read this book? Back to the beginning. James is a master of language. He employs a unique and intriguing 3rd person narrative voice that serves as a near exterior voice of Strether. To further the 360 degree view of Strether, James adds a friend in Paris named Maria Gostrey who patiently listens to Strether's journey, experiences and thoughts throughout. The plot of retrieving Chad is secondary to the more consequential self-reflection of Strether as he weighs his life, his trip and his future. Strether's awakening is filled with hope, regret and dwindling time. He is a man rediscovering his joie de vivre, but perhaps years too late.

It is thick, intellectually, dry and brilliant, but not a page-turner. James literary skills are keen and well developed at this stage in his career. He pours out pages of lengthy text that shows his dexterity but also a lack of appreciation for the patience of his reader to keep pace with his verbosity. Consider this a book that elite readers with extreme patience may enjoy but certainly a very small percentage of the overall active reading base.

Ok, I KNOW this is great literature and all, but it was like reading through a bowlful of jello - lots of effort to slog through a dense medium.
After reading the forward, I knew I was going to need some help - so I read the synopsis ahead of time - which I highly recommend. Knowing what was happening (It wasn't a complicated story line) allowed me to simply pay attention to the language and the occasionally very sharp humor that James sprinkles through this too-long novel. Written on the theory that 100 words are better than 10, The Ambassadors is a wordy tome, about a 50-something man, Strether, who is sent to Europe from a provincial town in Massachusetts, to retrieve his sort-of fiancee's wayward son in Paris from the clutches of an "awful" woman. All is not as is seems to be, of course, or there would be no story. And you end up learning so much about the interior life of Strether that you are worn down to the point of not caring. I'm glad I read it - just like eating a plate of liver as a child- but it's not an experience that I wish to repeat. Choose Portrait of a Lady instead - you'll be glad!

The Master. This is an utterly complex read and I'm totally not at a level in reading English that I can handle it. But it is so inspiring to read the drama of Lambert Strethers stay in Paris with the aim of bringing home young Chad to his fiancée Mrs Newsome in Boston (Wollett). As said, the complexity is immense and just every sentence seem like a maze and a mystery. It can only be re-read this book likely. First time to grasp the setting and the simple plot. Next time to dive into the abyss of James' prose. A book for the happy few I reckon.

Very dry and drawn out. I wouldn't bother with this one.

There is a moment in the 2001 film "Zoolander" when fashion mogul Jacobim Mugatu, in complete bewilderment at how male model Derek Zoolander can be celebrated for his many "looks," says, "Magnum? Blue Steel? They're the SAME LOOK! I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!"

Such was my response in my attempt to read "The Ambassadors", given its reputation and placement as one of the great novels of the 20th century.

A bit of context before I'm written off as a cretin without the refined sensibilities needed to appreciate "The Master."

First, this isn't my first go around with James. I read both "Turn of the Screw" and "The Spoils of Poynton." The former I felt was slightly disappointing; the latter I was fairly neutral on.

Second, I'm a Ph.D.-holding English professor who enjoys fiction that others would find prolix. "Middlemarch" is my favorite novel of all time. I find Austen endlessly engaging. Thomas Hardy is my jam. In fact, I organized my entire first trip to England around making pilgrimages to sites associated with these authors.

Having said that, I could not finish "The Ambassadors." I got halfway through, and I started becoming so frustrated and angry with the writing, the characters, and the entire aesthetic of the novel that I actually started to dread the time I set aside for pleasure reading because I knew the muck of "The Ambassadors" was waiting for me to wade through. When I realized that I would rather not read at all than continue with the novel, I tapped out--not something I ever do. The "good student" in me won't allow me to quit books. God help me, I actually trudged my way through the entirety of "The Fountainhead" (not altogether by choice, but still).

While acknowledging that such judgments are subjective, here's some of what made "The Ambassadors" literally unreadable for me, even when similar books--including others of James--hadn't had that effect on me.

First, the alleged "realism" James is famous for is, at least in this book, not real at all. James is writing between the era of realism seen in Victorian fiction (let's call this "object" realism, in which external situations are portrayed realistically) and modern realism (psychological realism that attempts to portray the inner workings of individual consciousness in a realistic way). So, it's not surprising that the novel reads like some sort of transitional moment between the two; but the result--at least for me--is unpleasant—bordering on grotesque. It does neither version of realism very well, and in that failure, its contrived nature is amplified. Perhaps the novel is important from an academic setting precisely because it captures this transition in narrative style, but that doesn't mean it works as fiction itself. The analogy that comes to mind is a fossil of one of those transitional creatures in the evolutionary tree that illustrate a moment in biological history when things were changing (e.g. feathered dinosaurs). But often, precisely because of this odd mixture of qualities, the actual organisms themselves died out. "The Ambassadors" is potentially a good discussion piece about the evolution of the novel, but as a standalone work of fiction, it's stillborn.

For example, the conversations the characters engage in are utterly preposterous--I cannot imagine anyone speaking as the characters in the novel do. To the extent the characters are allowed to speak for themselves by the narrator, the result is cutesy cleverness rather than anything that rings even slightly true to lived experience. No amount of willing suspension of disbelief made the interactions among the characters seem authentic. Every time Strether is speaking with Maria Gostrey, Chad, or Madame de Vionnet, I feel I'm reading dialog written by a pretentious MFA student attempting to be artful. I have an easier time believing the historical Richard III spoke in iambic pentameter than that any actual human beings spoke to each other in the contrived, pseudo-clever way of James’s characters.

Of course, the dialog is meant to be simply the "tip of the iceberg" of the underlying machinations of the characters, but again, the portrayal of what is going on inside the characters (almost exclusively Strether) is presented in such a contrived fashion that I felt unable to muster even a smidgen of empathy for any of the characters. And when I say "empathy", I don't mean that I have to like them. I just have to believe in them enough to see things as they see them. James, to my eyes, is far too busy calling attention to the language itself (which, to add to the issue, is not particularly memorable or engaging) to bother offering the reader any actual connection with the characters.

And on the issue of character, if there is a more annoyingly oh-so-clever character in literature than Maria Gostrey, I am unfamiliar with them. Again, simply being an annoying character is not a problem--literature is filled with them. It's not that the character herself is annoying within the world of the novel, but the presentation of her to the reader (at least this reader) is so trite and contrived as to be maddening. This is amplified by the fact that (again, to my eyes), she seems to be intended by her creator to be this utterly charming, mysterious, charismatic figure. Yet, when I spotted the name "Gostrey" on the page, I thought to myself, "God, not her again!" It’s possible that Madame de Vionnet would give her a run for her money—there were signs of it when she was introduced. But it wasn’t long after she appeared on the stage that I decided enough was enough.

Some fault James in general and this novel in particular for a lack of plot. Supposedly, the original idea for the novel was intended to be a short story. Stretching out a rather nothing plot to 500 pages does present a risk. And since putting the book down, I read an anecdote about it claiming that long after being in print, it was discovered by some careful reader that two of the chapters had been published out of order without anyone having noticed before. Whether true or not, it’s easy to believe given the wispiness of the plot and the meandering of the narrative.

But to me, it's not that. Lots of great works of literature, particularly novels, can mine small nuances and seemingly inconsequential events for deep insights. Those who think Jane Austen novels are nothing more than conversations over tea with the vicar are missing the fact that Austen *can* actually take a simple, everyday series of events, capture them realistically, *and* find depth.

So it wasn't the thinness of the plot--I could imagine the same characters and events being portrayed to great artistic effect. But there is a quality that I could only finally describe as "inhuman" in James's treatment of the story. I didn’t get the sense that James himself cared about his characters. They came across like constructs meant to display something like cleverness, and therefore to show the author’s own cleverness. And it’s this perceived lack of interest or care in the characters or his readers that ultimately gave me the sense that the I was keeping company with a bona fide misanthrope. One might imagine that James didn’t have the emotional wherewithal or artistic ability to create a narrative that had some humanness in it, but that hardly seems likely. If nothing else, James seems to be someone capable of producing what he wants on the page. If we assume this, the only conclusion is that “The Ambassadors” represents what James thought was a proper ethical and aesthetic view for the novel. And if so, he’s not someone in whose company I wish to be any longer.

I hadn’t read much *about* “The Ambassadors” until after having put it down, but on the off chance that I might learn that the novel redeemed itself in the second half, I did a bit of reading and saw that there was no reason to think the novel would change for me in the second half. Indeed, it sounds as if the characteristics I loathed only become more pronounced.

On the plus side, I discovered that I wasn’t quite as alone as I might have feared when it comes to people who take literature seriously and who actively dislike the novel. F.R. Leavis, the eminent historian and critic of the genre of the novel said the following:

“[The Ambassadors] produced an effect of disproportionate ‘doing’—of a technique the subtleties and elaborations of which are not sufficiently controlled by a feeling for value and significance in living.”

When it comes to “The Ambassadors,” I’m with him.

As a coda, I would strongly suggest not giving up on the James family. Henry’s brother, the philosopher/psychologist William James, can actually be read with great joy. Oddly enough, he’s a much finer wordsmith than his novelist brother, and even a paragraph or two from “The Varieties of Religious Experience” have (to my eyes) much more insight into the human condition and of true lived experience than the entirety of what his brother can scrape out in the two and a half books of his I’ve read.

Utter drivel from a deranged Francophile. A gob of spit in the face of the American spirit and an insult to all literate people.

My second time through, and I'm happy to find that I still love the thing to bits, and for the reasons I love all James: it's not about what happens, it's about coming to understand why it happens. Were I being over the top and polemical, I would say: all novels worth reading, since this one, have done precisely that.

https://kansasbooks.blogspot.com/2023...

"Leyó las cartas una tras otra y despacio, guardándose las demás en el bolsillo, pero dejándolas antes un buen rato en el regazo. Las dejaba allí, abstraído en sus pensamientos, como para prolongar la presencia de lo que le proporcionaban; o como si al menos le garantizaran su parte en la construcción de cierta lucidez."


Mientras leía esta novela llegué a preguntarme si el mundo que retrata Henry James tendría algún sentido hoy en día, porque era un mundo en el que la gente se tomaba todo el tiempo del mundo en releer una carta, darle una vuelta, y otra, guardarla, y volver a releerla mientras esperaba la siguiente, o se preparaba para responderla y durante esos espacios de tiempo entre una carta y otra, la vida continuaba, hasta que esta rutina volvía a detenerse con la llegada de una nueva epístola. Todo esto ha sido sustituido hoy en día por los mensajes instantáneos, que se leen, masivamente a medida que nos van llegando, y al momento ya han sido olvidados. En el mundo epistolar jamesiano por llamarlo de alguna forma, estas cartas son las que construyen la atmósfera de lo que ocurre en la cabeza de su receptor, : “Después de cerrar la puerta cogió las numerosas hojas sueltas de su carta inacabada, y luego, sin volver a leerlas, las rompió en trozos pequeños.”. Y por supuesto una carta concreta determinaba las acciones de más de un personaje sin que el emisor estuviera fisicamente presente en ningún momento durante la novela, y sin embargo, resulta tan concluyente para elaborar esta atmósfera jamesiana, que realmente te hace ser consciente de todo lo que se ha perdido a la hora de poder comunicarnos: esos tiempos y esa anticipación de lo incierto y que aquí consigue transmitir tan bien Henry James. Durante "Los Embajadores", el protagonista, Lambert Strether recibe las cartas de la señora Newsome , un personaje femenino totalmente presente en la novela solo a través de sus cartas, la gracia está en que Henry James no se preocupa en transcribir estas cartas ¿para qué?, lo importante estará en cómo influirá en las acciones de su receptor a través de la narración de Henry James.


“Era la diferencia, la diferencia de estar justo donde estaba y cómo estaba, lo que constituía la evasión: una diferencia que era mucho mayor de lo que había soñado, y lo que por fin se sentó a meditar allí fue la extraña lógica de sentirse tan libre.“


De todas formas, Los Embajadores no es para nada una novela epistolar, igual me he perdido por los Cerros de Úbeda y si he empezado a hablando de las cartas, es porque asientan una buena base del argumento de esta novela, que creo, que ya se ha convertido en mi novela favorita de Henry James. No es una novela epistolar, realmente es una novela sobre el choque de culturas entre gente que tiene un pie en Europa y otro en Estados Unidos, como venía siendo habitual en el mundo jamesiano, esa fascinación por el viejo mundo de Henry James, que realmente no era tan viejo en su concepción, sino que para él Europa era una especie de liberación en contraposición al puritanismo americano, y en este novela, se hace continuamente patente esta liberación desde el momento en que su protagonista Lambert Strether llega a Europa, primero a Chester, Inglaterra, para posteriormente llegar a su destino, París. Lambert es un americano de Woollet, Massachusetts que acude en una misión orquestada por la que se podría convertir en su futura esposa, la señora Newsome. La señora Newsome convierte a Latham en una especie de embajador con instrucciones pertinentes de traerse a su hijo de vuelta para que se haga cargo del bollante negocio familiar y deje a esa mujer de dudosa reputación que ha conocido en París; de esta misión dependerá también si el futuro de Lambert seguirá ligado al de ella… ¿una prueba de fuego por la que tendrá que pasar Lambert??


“... le había procurado la conciencia de una libertad personal que no conocía desde hacía años; una muestra tan profunda del cambio, y por encima de todo de la falta de la obligación de preocuparse por nada ni por nadie..."


Esta misión “diplomática” sin embargo se verá trastornada desde el momento en que Lambert empieza a caer bajo el hechizo de París, que podría ser para él una metáfora de la liberación. Poco a poco y gradualmente desde el momento en que llega a París comenzará a establecer comparaciones con su vida en Woollett y a partir de aquí, su mente parece que se verá en un conflicto continuo entre la imagen preconcebida y llena de prejuicios que había tenido de la vida en Paris, en contraposición al encorsetamiento del lugar de donde proviene, Woollet: que es un simbolo de la cerrazón y el provincialismo local de los Estados Unidos. Nada más llegar a Europa, Lambert conoce a Maria Gosfrey americana afincada en Europa, que se convertirá en una especie de guía y confidente: "- Bueno, prometo no volver a dejarle, pero lo único que haré será seguirle. Ya tiene usted empuje suficiente para andar solo.", y que será la prueba de que es una americana que ha podido huir de ese provincialismo americano. Maria Gosfrey es la antitesís a esa cultura americana de mujeres puritanas y chismosas que Lambert había conocido en Woollet, y a partir de ese momento y gracias a ella, se encuentra cuestionando el mundo del que viene y estableciendo comparaciones continuas. Lambert comprobará que Chad no se ha denigrado en Paris, sino todo lo contrario, se ha refinado y liberado, un reconocimiento que le hará entrar en conflicto interno con las instrucciones en forma de cartas que le van llegando de parte de su madre, la señora Newsome.


“Él se alegraba muchísimo de verla, y le expreso con franqueza lo más importante que ella le había enseñado: que era posible vivir años sin sospechar la existencia de algo beneficioso, pero que descubrirlo por fin equivalía a necesitarlo o a echarlo de menos para siempre. Ella era ese gran beneficio que ahora se le había hecho necesario, y ¿qué mejor prueba que lo perdido que había estado en su ausencia?"


A lo largo de esta novela, Lambert pasa de ser un puritano y estrecho de miras a un hombre de mentalidad cada vez más abierta y sus reflexiones al respecto son apabullantes en el sentido de que es consciente por primera vez de que nunca había actuado por propia voluntad ni siquiera había tenido confianza en sí mismo. Las instrucciones de la señora Newsome son cada vez más cuestionadas por su parte, hasta el punto de que la estabilidad de un futuro con ella peligre y en este aspecto quizá lo más impactante es la forma que tiene Henry James de conducirnos a través de este cambio interior en Lambert Strether usando una voz narrativa que debió ser un referente en aquella época, porque aunque tengamos la impresión de que la novela está contada en primera persona, realmente es un narrador onmisciente el que nos está conduciendo a través de la trama, y esa impresión de que puede ser una voz en primera persona viene por el hecho de que este narrador ominisciente casi nunca se desvía del punto de vista de Lambert. Es un narrador omnisciente que nunca abandona Lambert, habla en tercera persona pero solo sabemos lo que sabe Latham, así que el lector tendrá que unir ciertas piezas que no es capaz de unir Lambert en el momento en que van ocurriendo. Es una forma prodigiosa de mantener el suspense, de mantener el climax por parte de Henry James y en este aspecto quizás lo más desfiante de esta narración es que somos conscientes de que la fiabilidad de Lambert puede estar en entredicho, por eso a su vez crea un personaje como el de Maria Gosfrey, que podría ser la luz o la amiga del lector a su vez, para que vaya aclarando la confusión en la que está sumido Lambert: "Habría equivalido a contarle demasiado de sí mismo y en ese momento era precisamente de sí mismo de quién estaba intentando escapar." Es una técnica narrativa yo diría que muy arriesgada para la época porque convierte esta novela en un texto muy moderno, muy avanzado, con información que puede resultar vaga pero el motivo está en este narrador omnisciente que nos transmite una información limitada casi exclusivamente a la percepción de Lambert porque aunque su punto de vista sea el predominante, no siempre es el correcto sobre todo en su fiabilidad a la hora de expresar las emociones de Lambert Strether… de esta forma Henry James convierte al lector en participante muy activo porque cada lector percibirá algo diferente a medida que el texto evoluciona.


"Tenía la sensación de que era allí, delante de él, cerca de él, una de esas raras mujeres de las que a menudo había oído hablar, o sobre las que había leído, o en las que había pensado, pero que nunca había conocido, cuya sola presencia, aspecto, voz, el hecho mismo de su ser desde el momento en que se hacían presentes producían una relación de simple reconocimiento."


El ritmo de esta novela es lento, sutil y apenas hay acción salvo la que bulle en la mente de Lambert Strether, pero ya sabemos que en las novelas de Henry James la mente es pura acción que no para a la hora de elucubrar, sobrepensar y establecer teorías antes de que ocurran los hechos, es la anticipación de la acción en la que Henry James era un maestro. Hacia mucho tiempo que no leía a Henry James y casi se me había olvidado el arte que tenía a la hora de sumergirnos en las reflexiones de sus personajes y en esta novela, riza el rizo a la hora de enfrentarnos a un personaje en continuo cambio. Es una novela mucho más compleja y que trata muchos más temas de los que he sido capaz de establecer en esta reseña, pero me quedo con la manera en que Henry James, casi sin llamar la atención trata temas que en su época debieron escocer como por ejemplo la manera en la que deconstruye las definiciones tradicionales de matrimonio, las ramificaciones en torno a sus intereses porque en esta novela los hombres también se beneficiaban económicamente a la hora de casarse, y había mujeres, tal como comprueba Lambert al llegar a París, que primaban la independencia por encima de estos intereses económicos. Finalmente Los Embajadores tiene un tono de comedia negra soterrada en la que la fínisima ironía de Henry James se carcajea entre lineas de muchos temas que en la época en la que novela fue publicada debieron ser tabú. Finísima novela.

"La señorita Gostrey tuvo que pensar cómo expresarlo.
- Bueno, yo soy imposible. Es imposible. Todo es imposible.
La miró un instante.
- Veo dónde quiere ir a parar. Todo es posible."

♫♫♫ "That Leaving Feeling" - Stuart Staples & Lhasa ♫♫♫

Crushing. Of the late James—I’ve now read all three!—this is the most relevant to my interests. James’ idea of a promise here is more interesting than I remember it being in his other works. The promise here unfolds before the reader in quick flashes: it’s always a promise of fidelity, but goes from being a fidelity to a spouse (and the conservative American way of life) to fidelity to oneself (a more liberal moral code). At the center of this cleaving to fidelity is an anxiety around what one is always missing by keeping a promise. How this unfolds in the final act, in the Lambinet-esque countryside, affected me deeply.

But there’s also the classic James ability for amazing invention, to turn a situation in such an original way that makes you guffaw—when, after 500 pages of moral and romantic entanglement, at the final conversation between the two protagonists, Chad begins to speak of his fascination with advertisement and the conversation basically ends there? So epic.

I guess I will circle back now to my original idea for this review which was talking about it in relation to James’ other late work, which I really didn’t do at all. The narrative of each work all have different shapes/objecthoods to them. Perhaps I’ll expand on this elsewhere but if the Golden Bowl is, quite literally, a bowl and The Wings of the Dove is a vase, then The Ambassadors is some sort of deceptive, Janus-headed object which I quite haven’t found the metaphor for yet. More on that soon.

Classic Serial R4x

This novel was originally published as a serial in the North American Review.

BBC BLURB: THE AMBASSADORS, adapted by Graham White from the Henry James novel centres on the predicament of Lambert Strether, a fifty-something New Englander lately arrived in Paris. Henry Goodman stars as the hapless protagonist in a novel many critics find James' finest.

Lambert Strether - Henry Goodman

Directed by Peter Kavanagh.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/...

On the theme of 'retrieving errant family members from continental europe', I prefer E M forster's 'Where Angels Fear to Tread'.

A curious reading experience, and, in the end, a remarkable one. After banging my head against the first two hundred pages of this novel over several weeks, something suddenly clicked in. Was it James's bizarre, flourishing syntax? Or the sudden realization that this is a simple plot, presented complexly? Was it to understand that, though we're in the 3rd person, we're deeply in the head of our protagonist, Strether, a character who is almost uniquely unreliable in his inability to think things TO HIMSELF - a passiveness I've not yet encountered in reading? It was all of it, of course, and I suddenly began to swoon, and marvel, to root for characters, charmed by the subtle mysteries of this work. The ending is marvelous - and I suspect, if I go back and re-read, that that blasted beginning is marvelous too.