'James in America: In Quest of (the) Material'

This essay provides an overview of the material basis for James's return to America in 1904-5, and demonstrates the ways in which pecuniary entanglements complicated the author's responses to the social world he encountered. Lionised on lecture platforms across the United States, James felt bitterly betrayed when periodical editors seemed reluctant to publish instalments of The American Scene in their pages. The seductive power of capital becomes a central theme not just in this last book of 'Impressions' (as James called it), but also in the late short stories that follow it.