Hillis Miller's brilliant new book reads a group of important works by Henry James, including the prefaces to the New York edition, Portrait of a Lady, The Awkward Age, The Wings of the Dove, and The Golden Bowl , through an exploration in them of the nature and function of speech acts. He shows that, for James, uses of languages that do not fit the usual textbook definition of a speech act can nevertheless be a way of doing something wIth words. In the extraordinary final paragraph of the preface to The Golden Bowl , Henry James affirms, in echo of Emerson, that writing is part of the `conduct of life'. `To "put" things', he says, `is very exactly and responsibly and interminably to do them.' Two elements usually kept distinct are here superimposed in a single act of language: the constative and the performative. With his characteristic blend of inspiration and James-like tenacity, Hillis Miller goes on to explore how such uses work throughout James's writing, for the characters, for the narrator, for James as a writer, and for the reader.
- ISBN10 1557864101
- ISBN13 9781557864109
- Publish Date 23 October 1994 (first published 31 January 1993)
- Publish Status Cancelled
- Out of Print 24 September 2004
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher John Wiley and Sons Ltd
- Imprint Blackwell Publishers
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 300
- Language English