On Kipling’s Stories And Arnold’s Essays: Insightful literary criticism from one of the original masters.

By Henry James

Henry James was born on 15 April 1843 and is regarded as one of the great literary figures of 19th Century writing. Born in New York, he moved between there and Europe, being tutored in Geneva, London, Paris, Bologna, and Bonn. At the age of 19 he briefly attended Harvard Law School, but preferred reading literature to studying law and settled the next year in England. He became a British subject in 1915, a year before his death on 28th February 1916. As well as an outstanding author he was also a dramatist, travel writer and most passionately, a literary critic. He advocated that all writers should be allowed the greatest possible freedom in presenting their view of the world. His voluminous writing as a literary critic was large in scope and textured in its depth. In this volume he writes on the works of Rudyard Kipling and Matthew Arnold. We also offer a wide selection of short stories and novels from Henry James. Search ‘Henry James A Word To The Wise’ to see our full collection.

• Language: English
• Publisher: A Word To The Wise
• Release date: Aug 20, 2013
• ISBN: 9781780009285

Henry James

Henry James (1843-1916) was an American author of novels, short stories, plays, and non-fiction. He spent most of his life in Europe, and much of his work regards the interactions and complexities between American and European characters. Among his works in this vein are The Portrait of a Lady (1881), The Bostonians (1886), and The Ambassadors (1903). Through his influence, James ushered in the era of American realism in literature. In his lifetime he wrote 12 plays, 112 short stories, 20 novels, and many travel and critical works. He was nominated three times for the Noble Prize in Literature.

Book preview

On Kipling’s Stories and Arnold’s Essays by Henry James

Henry James (1843-1916) is today remembered as the most prolific of American novelists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.  

Undoubtedly the quality of his writing has ensured his name is enshrined in the American literary tradition and of American heritage in general.

James however was a committed Anglophile and lived most of his life as an expatriate in Europe.  Many of his novels juxtapose the Old World with the New World. Classics such as The Portrait of a Lady, Daisy Miller and The Ambassadors, display the encounter between American and European cultures and mentalities. They highlight the differences between the two worlds through following the experiences of American expatriates in Europe.

As a critic James was unafraid to venture into reviews and essays of those other literary giants around him.  These together with his short stories and, of course, classic novels, make Henry James an author to be not only admired but read, and read often.

Index of Contents

On Rudyard Kipling’s Stories

On Matthew Arnold’s Essays

Henry James – A Short Biography

Henry James – A Concise Bibliography

On Rudyard Kipling’s Stories

Originally published as an Introduction to the Continental edition of Soldiers Three. By Rudyard Kipling; volume 59 of the English Library, Leipzig, Heinemann and Balestier Limited, London. 1891.

It would be difficult to answer the general question whether the books of the world grow, as they multiply, as much better as one might suppose they ought, with such a lesson of wasteful experiment spread perpetually behind them. There is no doubt, however, that in one direction we profit largely by this education: whether or not we have become wiser to fashion, we have certainly become keener to enjoy. We have acquired the sense of a particular quality which is precious beyond all others, so precious as to make us wonder where, at such a rate, our posterity will look for it, and how they will pay for it. After tasting many essences we find freshness the sweetest of all. We yearn for it, we watch for it and lie in wait for it, and when we catch it on the wing (it flits by so fast) we celebrate our capture with extravagance. We feel that after so much has come and gone it is more and more of a feat and a tour de force to be fresh. The tormenting part of the phenomenon is that, in any particular key, it can happen but once, by a sad failure of the law that inculcates the repetition of goodness. It is terribly a matter of accident; emulation and imitation have a fatal effect upon it. It is easy to see, therefore, what importance the epicure may attach to the brief moment of its bloom. While that lasts we all are epicures. 

This helps to explain, I think, the unmistakeable intensity of the general relish for Mr. Rudyard Kipling. His bloom lasts, from month to month, almost surprisingly, by which I mean that he has not worn out even