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The Commedia Dell’Arte Tradition and Three Later Novels of Henry James

Helder, Jack
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1566297702059074

Abstract Details

1974, Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, English.
What Maisie Knew, The Awkward Age, and The Golden Bowl form a sequential pattern that manifests Henry James's subtle adaptation of theatrical conventions derived from the commedia dell'arte tradition. Recognition of this adaptation adds a further dimension to conceptions of James as a dramatic novelist, one that not only comments on his method, but which also contributes to interpretation of his thematic intentions. This study commenced with a description of the essential nature of the commedia dell'arte tradition. The term "commedia dell'arte tradition" was used in deference to the dynamically evolutionary history, spontaneous personality, and assimilation into Western culture of the various forms of the Italian Popular Comedy since the Renaissance. Moreover, during James' formative years, that tradition suffered a relative eclipse which precluded his direct experience with purer forms. Autobiographical, biographical, critical, and historical resources document James' appreciative familiarity with remnants of that tradition. His acquaintance was initiated by story books and the "earliest aesthetic seeds" sown at Niblo's Gardens. Europe later provided him with the English Harlequinade, pantomime, and puppetry. James was undoubtedly aware of the fin de siecle revival of interest in the tradition that involved Maurice Sand, Symonds, Beardsley, Shaw, and Howells. A textual analysis of What Maisie Knew, The Awkward Age, and The Golden Bowl delineated and examined James' adapted elements. His later method of improvising from a scenario was an appropriate step in his creation of the "fools" surrounding his ingenues, fools drawn from Pantalone, Capitano, the meddlesome zanni, and a variety of innamorati and parasites. Such types determined the nature and direction of the sexual intrigues which animate the plots of these novels, and provided a grimly satirical comedy which, as George Sand said of the commedia dell'arte, revealed "the spiritual poverty of mankind." James accompanied these types and plots with sexual humor and figurative elements drawn from the dramatic circus and ironic fairy-tale. These adapted materials create a pattern which approaches James' theory of "The Figure in the Carpet", a concept of form that was developed within a few months of the fullest scenarii for What Maisie Knew, The Awkward Age, and The Golden Bowl.
Alma J. Payne (Advisor)
American Literature

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Helder, J. (1974). The Commedia Dell’Arte Tradition and Three Later Novels of Henry James [Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1566297702059074

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Helder, Jack. The Commedia Dell’Arte Tradition and Three Later Novels of Henry James. 1974. Bowling Green State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1566297702059074.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Helder, Jack. "The Commedia Dell’Arte Tradition and Three Later Novels of Henry James." Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University, 1974. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1566297702059074

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

bgsu1566297702059074
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