James, Henry ___ 1843-1916 ___ American ___ writer

BIOGRAPHICAL SUMMARY
James was born in New York City into a wealthy family which travelled to Europe often. There, he was taught by tutors in Britain, Switzerland, France and Italy. His father was a Swedenborgian theologian, and his brother became a philosopher. Although briefly enrolled at Harvard Law School, James soon decided to be a writer, publishing short stories and contributing to magazines such as 'Nation' and 'Atlantic Monthly'. He made several trips to Europe, where he met Ruskin, Darwin and Rossetti as well as literary figures including Turgenev and Flaubert. In 1876 he settled permanently in London, where he devoted himself to literature and travel. In his early novels - including 'Daisy Miller' and 'The Portrait of a Lady' - as well as in some of his later work, James contrasts the sophisticated, traditional Europeans with innocent brash Americans. After unsuccessfully trying to become a playwright he wrote some of his greatest novels, such as 'The Aspern Papers', 'The Turn of the Screw' and 'The Ambassadors'. Later in his life, he lived in Rye, on the Sussex coast. He became a British citizen in 1915 and received the Order of Merit from King George V in 1916. There are volumes of James' diaries at the Houghton Library, but information about them seems very scarce.
A biography link
Wikipedia bio

DIARY DATES, CONTENT DESCRIPTORS
1878-1915 ___ literary travel

WEB TEXT LINKS
couple of quotes
 

ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT LINKS
Harvard University: Houghton Library

SOME PUBLISHED TITLES

 

May 2005, July 2008
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IMPORTANT NOTES AND CAUTIONS: 1) The first line of basic information may be incomplete in several ways: some historical figures have different names (titles, pen-names); their birth and death dates may be unknown or uncertain (g - guess, c - circa); similarly, their occupations may be unknown, or they may have had other jobs; and, for early diarists, I've used 'British' a bit too freely. 2) The biographical summary may not be accurate. It was compiled quickly from various sources, mostly on the internet, and the facts were not checked anywhere near as rigorously as they would have been if they'd been intended for publication in a printed form. 3) The journal dates and descriptors (which are in no particular order) must be treated with caution: since I have not examined the diaries myself, the descriptors are only guesses based on bibliographies, anthologies and internet biographies. 4) For the biography and etext links, I have ignored any sites with charges, and I have avoided, wherever possible, those with pop-ups or too much advertising. I have limited myself to providing three etext links where there is some variety between them. 5) For the original manuscript links, I have limited myself to providing a maximum of two (although, for a few diarists, their original diaries are held in more than two places). 6) I have provided the titles - chosen randomly - for up to three printed editions of the diaries.