The Portrait of a Lady

Henry James's beloved masterpiece, now in a beautiful hardcover edition featuring James's groundbreaking essay "The Art of Fiction," with a foreword by acclaimed novelist Brandon TaylorA Penguin Vitae EditionHenry James's beloved masterpiece, now in a beautiful hardcover edition featuring James's groundbreaking essay "The Art of Fiction," with a foreword by acclaimed novelist Brandon TaylorA Penguin Vitae EditionThe Portrait of a Lady is regarded by many as Henry James's finest work, and a lucid tragedy exploring the distance between money and happiness. When Isabel Archer, a beautiful, spirited American, is brought to Europe by her wealthy Aunt Touchett, it is expected that she will soon marry. But Isabel, resolved to enjoy the freedom that her fortune has opened up and to determine her own fate, does not hesitate to turn down two eligible suitors. Then she finds herself irresistibly drawn to Gilbert Osmond. Charming and cultivated, Osmond sees Isabel as a rich prize waiting to be taken. Beneath his veneer of civilized behavior, Isabel discovers cruelty and a stifling darkness. In this portrait of a "young woman affronting her destiny," Henry James created one of his most magnificent heroines, and a story of intense poignancy.

Henry James (1843-1916) was born in New York and died in London. In addition to many short stories, plays, and books of criticism, autobiography, and travel, he wrote some twenty novels, the first published being Roderick Hudson (1875). They include The Europeans, Washington Square, The Portrait of a Lady, The Bostonians, The Princess Casamassima, The Tragic Muse, The Spoils of Poynton, The Awkward Age, The Wings of the Dove, The Ambassadors, and The Golden Bowl.Brandon Taylor is the author of the acclaimed novel Real Life, which has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize, longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, and named a New York Times Book Review Editors'Choice, and Filthy Animals. He holds graduate degrees from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Iowa, where he was an Iowa Arts Fellow at the Iowa Writers'Workshop in fiction.

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