Book 5 Summary and Analysis
Summary
Chad invites Strether to go with him to the home of Gloriani, the renowned sculptor. Strether agrees, mainly because Madame de Vionnet and her daughter, the rumored women in Chad’s life, will be present. Strether is very impressed when meeting the artist, but feels he is somehow being put to the test, a test that he fears he has failed. Little Bilham, who is also in attendance, gives him some reassurance.
Little Bilham tells Strether that Madame de Vionnet’s husband is still alive, and he insinuates that Chad is in love with the daughter. Miss Barrace is excited to see them. She speaks of little Bilham as an American coming to convert the savages. The fact that he has been converted himself, she claims, was inevitable. However, she believes Waymarsh will be the one to resist conversion.
As Chad introduces Madame de Vionnet to him, Strether is impressed by Chad’s gift for presentation. He finds that Madame de Vionnet is not what he expected; there is less a feeling of “wealth” than he had in his mental image of her. He is also surprised that she and Miss Gostrey had been previously acquainted. More than anything, he is struck by the fact that he could not imagine her in Woollett nor can he envision visiting her there as he is does Paris.
Talking with little Bilham, Strether tells the young artist to live for the moment. In his past, Strether had the illusion of freedom. Now, too late, he realizes he was mistaken. He urges little Bilham not to make his mistake and to live.
When Chad brings Jeanne, Madame de Vionnet’s daughter, to meet him he has a sudden revelation that it is she who is Chad’s lover, not her mother. After they leave, Strether turns to little Bilham to discuss this, but he finds that the young man has gone.
When Miss Gostrey joins him, Strether tells her of his discovery. She in turn tells him that Madame de Vionnet is an old school friend with whom she has lost contact. As a result, Miss Gostrey washes her hands of the affair and will no longer be involved in Chad’s and the de Vionnets’ relationships, whatever they may be. Miss Gostrey gives Strether some additional background, namely, that Monsieur de Vionnet was a brute, and Madame de Vionnet has lived apart from him for several years. It is also impossible for them to choose to divorce. Miss Gostrey also informs Strether that Madame de Vionnet has influenced Chad’s growth in sophistication so that he may marry her daughter.
The next day Chad tells Strether that Madame de Vionnet desperately wants to see him. Strether asks Chad if he and Jeanne are engaged. Chad replies that they are not. He simply wants Strether to get to know Madame de Vionnet. He wants to leave, but he must make some kind of understanding with her concerning his debt to her instruction. Chad promises that, if Strether makes the acquaintance of Madame de Vionnet, he will go back with him. In answer to Strether’s concern, he assures him that she is above reproach.
Analysis
Strether’s meeting with Gloriani further reveals his intense insecurity. Coming to Paris, he feels he is constantly being tested for his ability and his worthiness. He expects this sort of judgment, because in Woollett, he was tested by Mrs. Newsome and Mrs. Pocock. This assignment is in itself a test—if he fails, the engagement is off. Therefore, it is easy to see how this feeling of failure follows him throughout his assignment. Despite his feeling of...
(This entire section contains 968 words.)
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freedom, he is tied to the opinions and judgments of others, always feeling that he comes up short. He is unable to accurately discern the relationship of Chad and the de Vionnets up to this point. It is ironic that his sudden “revelation” leads him to believe that it is with Jeanne, the daughter, with whom Chad is involved. He is easily misled by others, but then so is Miss Gostrey, despite her worldly wisdom. Chad has successfully fooled them all. It is also ironic that, being sent to find out about Chad’s relationship to a woman, Strether himself will fall into the almost identical situation with Miss Gostrey. In the end, he will have to choose between her and Mrs. Newsome. Despite Mrs. Newsome’s poor opinion of him as an ambassador, she does not see that he himself might fall to the clutches of another woman, especially one that is more in tune with the world at large, closer to Madame de Vionnet than to Mrs. Newsome.
This insecurity, however, is but a stage in Strether’s transition from the tyranny of Mrs. Newsome and Mrs. Pocock in Woollett and his newfound freedom in Paris. He is moving from weakness to strength, despite his uneasy feelings concerning his standing in the eyes of others. He is learning to be an individual, making his own decisions, and evaluating his own standards and behaviors as he becomes more free.
It is Strether’s charge to little Bilham to live life to the fullest that is the central theme of the novel. In fact, throughout many of James’s works, the tragedy of the unlived life is the dominant focus. Strether, in his insecurity, realizes that he has lived his life on someone else’s terms, or in consideration of others’ opinions, rather than his own concept of himself. He sees his marriage to Mrs. Newsome not as a new beginning of his later life, but a continuation of his past failures. His resolution of this inner conflict therefore will be the final denouement of the story as his ambassadorial assignment comes to a conclusion later on.
