Henry James: Daisy Miller * Washington Square * Portrait of a Lady * The Bostonians * The Aspern Papers

Henry James looked at his society-its rules and foibles-with a sharp, unsparing eye. Shifting from America to Europe, the new world and the old, he saw how rigid conventions could destroy lives and happiness. Five of James’s classic, richly textured novels, in their entirety, present a cast of indelible characters and Daisy Miller , the tragic tale of an innocent young American girl in Rome; Washington Square , set in the heartless upper crust of James’s native New York; The Portrait of a Lady , the master craftsman’s acknowledged masterpiece; The Bostonians , a tart, high comedy about marriage and nascent feminism; and The Aspern Papers , about an editor’s desperate attempts to get hold of letters by a romantic poet to his mistress–who has no intention of giving them up.