Paul's Reviews > The Europeans

3.5 stars; rounded up.
A brief novella, which is effectively a comedy of manners, in which, on the surface, little happens. It reminded me of Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence. The plot is simple; Felix Young and his sister Eugenia are the Europeans. Felix is a painter, who lives a bohemian lifestyle. He is incessantly (nauseatingly) cheerful. His sister Eugenia is in a morganatic marriage and her husband’s family want a divorce. They lead a wandering, essentially frivolous lifestyle. They decide to visit their American cousins, the Wentworths. Head of the family is their uncle Mr Wentworth. He has two daughters, Gertrude and Charlotte. Charlotte is very serious and religious, Gertrude is restless and uncertain what she wants. Their younger brother Clifford has just been suspended from Harvard for drinking. Throw into the mix Mr Brand, a Unitarian minister who wants to marry Gertrude and the Actons and you have the lot. Robert Acton is a friend of the family who has been to China and made his fortune and is supposed to be worldly wise. His sister Lizzie makes up the main players. The Wentworth’s are New England Puritans of a certain moral tone and life is a serious business.
This is often portrayed as James having a swipe at Americans; however it isn’t that simple as Felix and Eugenia are American as well. The employment of an omniscient narrator means James is able to remain entirely neutral in telling his tale. He analyses a Puritan morality, contrasting it with a more “modern” reliance on feelings, emotions and the self. A type of individualism compared to the communal stiltedness of Puritan New England. Gertrude knows she does not wish to marry Mr Brand but does not know how to go about expressing it. Felix and Eugenia are more self-confident. James is critical of the Puritanism of the Wentworth’s, but it is tempered with an underlying affection as he also finds much to admire. Mr Wentworth is not the tyrannical father he could have been; he just does not understand the approach to life of his European cousins, though he does try. The real villain is Robert Acton who seems more modern and aware, but proves not to be.
A fairly light confection, with a little more going on than meets the eye, but a good introduction to James.