Henry James’s ‘international-theme’ and his narrative

Abstract

One tool that impressively support Henry James’s complicated writing style is his ‘unreliable narrators’, but especially in his ‘international-theme’ novels, decent and reliable narrators play important roles. Winterbourne, the narrator in Daisy Miller makes a good example, who offers satisfactory reports to the reader as if he were a popular blogger today. When we focus on accessibility or modernity of James, reliable narrators and drastic omission in his stories can be the key to understand James’s stories. Traditionally, ‘international-theme’ novels is the term used for the novels in which James treated international relationships, but in this paper we’ll find another meaning we should add to these stories of James’s.