English 495/504 Fall 2003 Stephan Flores

Critical Summary-Response Assignment

The Critical Summary-Response (600-700 words, titled, single-spaced) presents a focused summary (Part 1, 250-300 words) of a critical perspective on The Portrait of a Lady and a reflective, question and problem-posing response (Part 2, 300-350 words) to that perspective.

Due date: Tuesday October 7, in-class.

Part 1 (250-300 words) should present a straightforward, selective account of the essay's most important ideas and points of argument and interpretation (for example, major or new points in the argument, a significant piece of support, the critic’s summary of the opposition, the critic’s explicit comment on assumptions/methods). As you work through Parts 1 and 2, consider to what extent and how the reading has influenced your views and understanding, determine points of agreement or doubt, determine significant questions raised by your experience with this essay, determine the most important ideas you "take away" from the reading, and reflect on what you might "say back" to the scholar in sharing your perspective on the essay and on James’s novel.

As you write the summary, work from your sense of the essay's structure and content: it may be helpful to have written the gist of each paragraph--its function or purpose and a brief summary of its content (what it "does" and what it "says," usually a response to an implicit question)--to produce material to consider for the summary.

Your summary should strive to represent the original article--or an important aspect of it--accurately and fairly. Be direct and concise, take an "objective" stance and tone, except for brief quotes use your own words to express the author's ideas, use attributive tags (such as according to Newman or Newman argues that) to keep the reader informed that you are expressing another's ideas, and focus the summary to produce a cohesive and coherent account. You might begin the summary by identifying the question or the problem that the reading addresses, then state the article's purpose or thesis and summarize its argument’s major points.

Part 2 (300-350 words) should express your understanding of the original essay's rhetorical strategies and critical premises, and the effectiveness and significance of its argument. You may also choose to extend the essay's perspectives by explaining its potential relevance to other aspects of the novel, or you may also read "against-the-grain" of the original argument to present a different or opposing perspective and argument based on your own understanding and reasoning, and/or on other critical perspectives. Your response can be both reflective and persuasive in its emphases and aims. You may find it effective to compose a thesis for your response that maps out for readers the challenging, engaging, important points that you want to develop and discuss. Finally, include a complete bibliographic citation to note the author, essay title, place of publication, publisher, date, and page numbers for the article.

On James's The Portrait of a Lady (the following essays and book chapters are on library reserve, listed under English 495):

Freedman, Jonathan. "Aestheticism and The Portrait of a Lady."Henry James: A Collection of Critical Essays. Ed. Ruth Bernard Yeazell. Prentice-Hall, 1994, 60-78.

Weisbuch, Robert. "Henry James and the Idea of Evil." The Cambridge Companion to Henry James, ed. J. Freedman (1998), 102-19.

Luciano, Dana. "Invalid Relations: Queer Kinship in Henry James's The Portrait of a Lady." Henry James Review 23 (2002): 196-217.

New Essays on The Portrait of a Lady, ed. Joel Porte. Cambridge UP, 1990. This collection includes Joel Porte's "Introduction: The Portrait of a Lady and 'Felt Life'," Donatella Izzo's "The Portrait of a Lady and Modern Narrative," Alfred Habegger's "The Fatherless Heroine and the Filial Son: Deep Background for The Portrait of a Lady," William Veeder's "The Portrait of a Lack," Beth Sharon Ash's "Frail Vessels and Vast Designs: A Psychoanalytic Portrait of Isabel Archer."

Henry James Review 7.203 (1986)—issue devoted to The Portrait of a Lady, including Cheryl Torsney’s essay “The Political Context of The Portrait of a Lady,” also Robert White on 'sexuality' in the novel, as well as other essays.

Hadley, Tessa. Henry James and the Imagination of Pleasure. Cambridge UP, 2002. See Ch. 1 on the last chapters of The Portrait of a Lady.

Sousa Santos, Maria Irene Ramalho de. "Isabel's Freedom: The Portrait of a Lady." Henry James, ed. Harold Bloom (Chelsea House, 1987), 301-13.

Woolf, Judith. Henry James, The Major Novels. Cambridge UP, 1991. See chapter 3, pp.35-58.

Rowe, John Carlos. The Other Henry James, esp. intro. on 'Henry James and Critical Theory'. Duke UP, 1998, 1-37.

Additional references (not on library reserve):