Henry James, Consciousness, and the Evolution of the Novel

Peter Rawlings redefines Henry James' position within transatlantic and pan-European contexts, linking his ideology of organicism in biology to philosophical and scientific thinking about consciousness and experience. His book explores the significance of American thinkers and their European antecedents, aligning James' essay "The Art of Fiction" with contemporary thinking on consciousness. Rawlings challenges the isolation of James from the procession of the novel from prose fiction and reexamines his canonization by the New Critics in the context of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European and North American philosophical, physiological, and biological discourses.

Format: Hardback
Length: 250 pages
Publication date: 01 January 2021
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

Peter Rawlings redefines Henry James' position within transatlantic and pan-European contexts, shifting the focus from aesthetics to biology. He contends that the novel as a genre, rooted in character representation, emerged from philosophical and scientific discussions about consciousness and experience that spanned two centuries between Europe and America. Rawlings' extensive study explores the influence of American thinkers and their European predecessors, from Jonathan Edwards to Josiah Royce, aligning James' 1884 essay "The Art of Fiction" with contemporary perspectives on consciousness and its intricate origins. By this time, Herbert Spencer had expanded Darwin's evolutionary ideas into the social realm, challenging traditional notions of consciousness as associated with the soul. Simultaneously, the fin-de-siècle fascination with panpsychism and the paranormal made a final stand against the emerging New Sciences. A central argument of Rawlings' book is that Henry James cannot be viewed in isolation from the pressing need to reassess the evolution of the novel from prose fiction, as advocated by influential critics like Ian Watt and Marthe Robert. James' canonization by the New Critics prompts Rawlings to reevaluate figures like Walter Scott, Jane Austen, Susan Warner, and George Eliot within the broader context of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European and North American philosophical, physiological, and biological discourses that shaped James' theoretical and practical approach to writing.

Dimension: 234 x 156 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781409423058