How James Kept the Pace?; A Look into the Organic Unity of Daisy Miller

Sina Movaghati, Milad Comcar

Abstract


Many Critics believe that Henry James has set the definitive standards of modern fiction writing. Undoubtedly his groundbreaking article “The Art of fiction,” which published for the first time in 1884, has a major contribution in developing the theories of fiction writing. The term Organic Unity has derived from a major Formalist Critic, Cleanth Brooks. Both James and Brooks believed that a critic should approach a text as an organic whole. So, in this article we try to pinpoint the ideas which James and Brooks claimed in their essays and see how these ideas conform to one of James’ well-known stories, Daisy Miller. We want to observe that how James develops and shapes his story around the central theme. Furthermore, we want to investigate that are there any literary devices embedded in the text of the story which help James to deliver his fiction with artistry?

Keywords: James, Cleanth Brooks, Organic Unity, The Art of Fiction, Daisy Miller


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References


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