The American Novel

The American is a novel by Henry James, originally published as a serial in The Atlantic Monthly in 1876-77 and then as a book in 1877. The novel is an uneasy combination of social comedy and melodrama concerning the adventures and misadventures of Christopher Newman, an essentially good-hearted but rather gauche American businessman on his first tour of Europe. Newman is looking for a world different from the simple, harsh realities of 19th-century American business. He encounters both the beauty and the ugliness of Europe, and learns not to take either for granted. The core of the novel concerns Newman's courtship of a young widow from an aristocratic Parisian family.PlotIn 1868, Christopher Newman, an American businessman, visits Europe on a Grand Tour. Having worked for a living since age ten (interrupted by service in the Union Army during the American Civil War), he has made a large fortune and retired in his thirties, and is now looking to settle down and get married.At the Louvre in Paris he watches a painter named Noémie; he offers to buy the copy she is making, and meets her father, M. Nioche. About the same time a mutual friend introduces Newman to Claire de Cintré, a young widow. Newman hires M. Nioche to teach him French and the two become friendly; Newman, learning that M. Nioche worries about his daughter's future since he is poor, says that he will buy enough paintings from Noémie to give her a respectable dowry. Meeting Newman at the Louvre the next day, though, Noémie frankly tells him that she has no talent and her paintings are worthless. She scorns the men she could marry even with a dowry, and hints that she would prefer a more exciting life. Newman either doesn't understand the hint or ignores it, and he leaves her to her work. He pays a visit to the Bellegarde estate, where he meets Claire's two brothers: the cheerful Valentin and the aloof Marquis de Bellegarde, who coldly rebuffs him.Newman and Valentin become good friends, and eventually he tells Valentin that he wishes to marry Claire; Valentin tells Newman that he has his support but he will find it hard going against the class prejudices of the Marquis and his mother, royalist supporters of the Bourbons. Newman proposes to Claire; after hesitating, because her first husband was abusive, Claire says she will consider it.Newman and Valentin visit the Louvre and find Noémie at work in a gallery. Noémie tells Newman she has finished none of the work she was to do for him, and in irritation she slashes a large red cross over her painting, obliterating it. Afterwards Valentin tells Newman that Noémie is certain to become the mistress of some rich man, though Newman objects that her respectable father would never allow it.Claire's mother tells Newman his "commercial" background makes him unfit, but when he tells her how rich he is, she reluctantly agrees not to oppose him. After some months Claire agrees to marry him, and the Bellegardes have a party in honor of the engagement. Newman hears town gossip that Noémie has become a courtesan; he goes to see M. Nioche, and finds him drinking in misery...Henry James, OM (15 April 1843 - 28 February 1916) was an American-British author regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the son of Henry James Sr. and the brother of renowned philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James.