Henry James's Rejection of the Sacred Fount

Abstract

The canon of Henry James's criticism is enriched in the New York Edition by more than the direct statement of the prefaces. James illustrated his critical cadre not only by prefaces and revisions but also by significant omissions. He outlined-negatively, as it were-his mature conception of what competent art should be by the very works which he deemed unfit to be included in the Edition. Moreover, of the seven novels which he omitted from the New York Edition, only The Sacred Fount belongs to his late manner, belongs to the years which saw the creation of The Ambassadors, The Golden Bowl, and The Wings of the Dove.' Thus, the failure of this novel to satisfy James as worthy to join the later three marks it as a significant commentary upon his final concept of the art of the novel. The Sacred Fount fails because it fails to mean-which is to say, for James, because it fails to be. The failure, then is one of form; it derives, as James came to see, from a violation of genre of the very form by which meaning was to be established. If we can analyze the faults of The Sacred Fount, we can see what James considered to be the valid form of the short story and the novel, what devices of presentation and point of view he held to be proper to each form, and what expression and meaning could be fitted into these forms. And, if we can see the failure of the Sacred Fount as James saw it, we may suggest an answer to the vexing question of what the novel means; for that failure has led many commentators to shrug the novel off as beyond interpretation and has forced some few into critical capriciousness.