Henry James, The Jolly Corner

Hazel McNair Hutchison (University of Leeds)

Ed. by Neil Cornwell, University of Bristol
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.3: American (US) Writing and Culture: The Early Twentieth-century , 1900-1945.
Vol. editors: J. Michael Duvall (College of Charleston), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Tony Papanikolas (San Jose State University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1908

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Story

Resources

Save to Bookshelf

James conceived the story of “The Jolly Corner” during his extended visit to America of 1904-5. Returning to his home country for the first time in over twenty years, James was overwhelmed by the speed and extent of the changes that had taken place in his absence. He notes in

The American Scene

(1907) that the New York of his childhood had been so “violently overpainted” with new tenements and skyscrapers that the city skyline now resembled “some colossal hair-comb turned upward and … deprived of half its teeth”. James saw social as well as material change. Industrialisation and immigration had transformed the demographics of the Eastern Seaboard, and had problematised the concept of an American national identity. In “The Jolly Corner”, published in the

English Review

in…

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

1003 words

Citation: Hutchison, Hazel McNair. "The Jolly Corner". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 04 February 2007 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=20113, accessed 22 November 2024.]

Henry James, The Jolly Corner

Dates

Places

Genres and Modes

Resources

Save this article

Leave Feedback