The Complete Letters of Henry James, 1872–1876: Volume 2(The Complete Letters of Henry James)

Recipient of the “Approved Edition” seal from the Modern Language Association’s Committee on Scholarly Editions The Complete Letters of Henry James fills a crucial gap in modern literary studies by presenting in a scholarly edition the complete letters of one of the great novelists and letter writers of the English language. Comprising more than ten thousand letters reflecting on a remarkably wide range of topics-from James’s own life and literary projects to broader questions about art, literature, and criticism-this edition is an indispensable resource for students of James and of American and English literature, culture, and criticism as well as for research libraries throughout North America and Europe and for scholars of James, the European novel, and modern literature. This volume is the second of three to include James’s letters from 1872 to 1876.

Table of Contents:
Contents   List of Illustrations   Acknowledgments   Symbols and Abbreviations     Chronology  Errata        1873 July 15     To Mary Walsh James     July 17     To Grace Norton   July 23     To Mary Walsh James     August 1    To Catharine Walsh      August 4    To Henry James Sr. and Mary Walsh James   August 5    To William James  August 10   To Sarah Butler Wister  August 14   To Henry James Sr. and Mary Walsh James   August 15   To Elizabeth Boott      September 3 To Alice James    September 9 To William Dean Howells September 15      To William James  September 22      To Mary Walsh James     September 26      To William James  October 18  To William Dean Howells October 26  To Henry James Sr.      November 2  To Henry James Sr.      November 16, 17  To Henry James Sr. and Mary Walsh James   December 3  To Henry James Sr.      December 10 To Elizabeth Boott      December 22 To Henry James Sr.        1874 January 4   To Samuel Gray Ward     January 9   To William Dean Howells January 13  To Alice James    January 14  To Grace Norton   February 5  To Henry James Sr. and Mary Walsh James   February 11 To Anna Hallowell February 15 To Henry James Sr. and Mary Walsh James   February 27 To Henry James Sr. and Mary Walsh James   February 28      To William James  March 1     To Editor of the Independent March 9     To Henry James Sr. and Mary Walsh James   March 10    To William Dean Howells March 22    To William James  April 4     To Mary Walsh James     April 7, 8  To Elizabeth Boott      April 18, 19     To Alice James    May 3 To William Dean Howells May 3 To William James  May 10      To Sarah Butler Wister  May 17      To Mary Walsh James     June 3      To Mary Walsh James     June 13     To William James  June 23     To Henry James Sr.      July 6      To William James  July 28     To Mary Walsh James     July 29     To Elizabeth Boott      July 29     To Sarah Butler Wister  October 13  To Robertson James      November 18 or 25, December 2 or 9, 1874 To H. O. Houghton and Co.     late December 1874January 1875  To Welch and Bigelow    December 22, 29, 1874, or January 5, 12, 19, or 26, or February 2, 1875      To Elizabeth Boott     1875 January 13  To William Dean Howells January 23  To Sarah Butler Wister  January 29  To Welch and Bigelow    February   To Wendell Phillips Garrison  March 8     To Elizabeth Boott      March 19 or 26   To William Dean Howells spring     To Anna Hazard Barker Ward    April 16    To Caroline Dall  April 27    To H. O. Houghton and Co.     May 27      To Mary Lucinda Holton James  late spring      To James Ripley Osgood  June 7      To George William Curtis June 7      To Caroline Dall  June 23 or 30    To William Dean Howells July 21     To John Milton Hay      August 5    To John Milton Hay      August 18   To John Milton Hay      August 18   To J. R. Osgood and Co. August 24   To H. O. Houghton and Co.     August 30   To H. O. Houghton and Co.     August 31   To James Ripley Osgood  September 1 To Edmund Clarence Stedman    October 7   To H. O. Houghton and Co.     October 13 To H. O. Houghton and Co.     October 13  To George Abbot James   October 15  To H. O. Houghton and Co.       Biographical Register   Genealogies General Editors' Note   Works Cited Index  

About the Author :
Henry James (1843–1916) wrote short stories, plays, literary criticism, and travel essays and is most famous for his many novels, which include The Portrait of a Lady, The Bostonians, The Ambassadors, and The Golden Bowl. American born, he spent considerable time in England and eventually became a British subject. When he died, he left behind more than ten thousand letters. Pierre A. Walker is a professor of English at Salem State College. He is the editor of Henry James on Culture: Collected Essays on Politics and the American Social Scene, available in a Bison Books edition, and the author of Reading Henry James in French Cultural Contexts. Greg W. Zacharias is a professor of English and the founder and director of the Center for Henry James Studies at Creighton University. He is the author of Henry James and the Morality of Fiction, editor of A Companion to Henry James, and coeditor of Tracing Henry James.

Review :
"The Letters collected in these elegant volumes, edited by Pierre A. Walker and Greg W. Zacharias, cover periods in which Henry James became Henry James... two things need to be said about this extraordinary job of editing that Walker and Zacharias have done. First, they print James's letters in plain text, reproducing his many misspellings and abbreviations and strike-outs: James wrote quickly and in an almost illegible hand; he blotted many words and yet hardly ever had to struggle for the right ones; his most aphoristic moments appear to have been spontaneous. Second, these letters contain an awful lot of proper names, many of them belonging to those who, like Edmund Tweedy, were obscure at the time and are more so now. Earlier editions of letters by Edel or Philip Horne, among others, have identified most of these figures. This edition gets them all, and both the footnotes and the biographical register at the back of each volume are at once succinct and full. They allow any reader to place and know the people in this busy social world." Michael Gorra, Times Literary Supplement Praise for earlier volumes: "These extraordinary, profoundly welcome volumes are the first fruits of an epic undertaking by two heroic American scholars, Pierre Walker and Greg Zacharias ... These early volumes give a wonderfully pleasurable picture of a writer at the beginning of his journey ..." Philip Horne, The Daily Telegraph "[James's] letters have never before appeared in their entirety. The University of Nebraska Press is attempting slowly, to make up for that fact in a scholarly edition that obviates the need for any other." Times Literary Supplement "Rippling through these letters are the first imaginative stirrings of one of the greatest fiction and travel writers in the language. He was also one of the most entertaining--and prolific--correspondents... These are richly enthralling letters. The sooner the next 138 or so volumes appear, the better." Peter Kemp, Sunday Times "Some of the letters from Italy are small masterpieces of description; they are alert and sensitive and full of astute judgements." London Review of Books "enthralling early letters from a genius in the making." Culture (Supplement to the Sunday Times), "The general public has been deprived of James's full epistolary record until now... All the more reason to celebrate the present volumes, handsomely produced and extensively and intelligently annotated." Peter Brooks, Bookforum