5/18/2023 0 Comments Washington Square by Henry JamesAnd of course the book is about those things.īut what strikes me now is the centrality of parental cruelty as a theme, a subject James would explore again to even more devastating effect 17 years later, in his novel of embittered divorce, “What Maisie Knew.” Or really something simpler: a cunning and desperate effort at money. I hadn’t read “Washington Square” in years - since high school, in fact - and if you’d asked me about it before I revisited it for this discussion, I would have said it wasĪbout a cunning and desperate effort at social ascension. “The Heiress” became a hit, runningįor 410 performances, and it was revived in the 1990s, with Cherry Jones receiving a Tony Award for her performance as Catherine. The play opened in Boston, failed and was reworked for the New York stage with an ending less cheerful. In this version, the diffident heroine Catherine A regular discussion with Ginia Bellafante.Interestingly, when the Goetzes produced their first draft of the play, a producer persuaded them to reconceive the story with a happy ending that James does not supply.
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