our appointed three hours drew to a close, Mr. James seemed to be enjoying himself more and more, perhaps not wanting to stop. He went out for a few minutes to ask Mrs. Paddington how long before his lunch would be ready, and I looked over what we had done so far.
I wondered for the first time how hard had it been for him to become a writer. Was his family like mine, not wanting him to be miserable, poor, and struggling? Even now, Father still hoped I might yet give up my career and marry, for my own good. I think my telling Father that I was training with Miss Petherbridge and was going to live with my friends in a London flat or even my telling him I was going to Rye to take the job with Mr. James had been easier for him to accept than my telling him that I hoped to be a writer.
Mr. James came heavily back up the stairs and, with some chagrin, announced that we would have to stop. The housekeeper was adamant: her lunch would not wait.
I stacked our finished pages and pulled the cover over the machine. As I stood, Mr. James urged me to take the Bourget book, and I did.
Soon, bundled and cautioned against the continuing bad weather, I was back outside in the gloomy day. The rain had lessened, but it was still wet and cold. Where was I to find my lunch? What was I to do with myself now? The arrangements with my landlady were for one hot meal in the evening, but I was on my own until then, and so I made my way down to the shops and found a dark loaf of that morning’s bread, a small yellow cheese, and a good bottle of ale. I took the purchases back to my room, tore off chunks of the cheese and slabs of the bread, arranged them on a piece of clean paper, and drank from my tooth cup (for of course my room came with no amenities of dishes or cutlery). I threw away the paper, rinsed out the cup, and looked around at my small, nearly windowless room, at the low brow of the eaves that blocked the light, the narrow bed, the dusty old spread, and the rusty corner sink. I washed out my shirtwaist, soot-stained from the train journey the day before, and spread it out to dry on the chair back.
I thought again about Mr. James and how his conversation had gone from a nervous, stilted defensiveness to, perhaps, real enjoyment. Even the way we ended had a hopefulness. Oh, he had not liked how poorly I typed, but he could see my work was improving with each new page, and I liked it when he added references to “us,” a collective we of readers and writers. I had noticed that usage when he dictated, “. . . and we look in vain for the artist Comma, the divine explanatory genius Comma, who will come to our aid and tell us Full Stop.” Mr. James had smiled, seeming almost hopeful, and I had smiled in agreement. Only time would reveal to me more about what I could do for him, with him.
The second day seemed easier than the first, since now I began to understand what he was doing. The New York Edition of his collected works was his artist’s canvas enlarged. He was a consummate and totally conscious, even self-conscious artist. The work we were doing on the prefaces was meant to frame and display, to varnish and polish his conscious art. I was in awe of these explanations of his process, and I wanted to learn everything I could from them.
From the moment I had heard his words being dictated to a typist down the hall all those months before, I had dreamed of sitting there beside Mr. James, helping him to achieve his dream and learning from the experience how to become a successful writer. Perhaps I might someday show him some of my work, but for now I was happy watching him exclaim proudly about every difficulty he had overcome, about how he had met all the challenges he had set for himself, handling such a large canvas combining art and politics in the same novel, steering his complex story through to its conclusion.
He had paused and then gone on. “Capital I I fairly cherish the record as some adventurer in another line may hug the sense of his inveterate habit of just saving in time the neck he ever [sic] undiscourageably risks . . .” There Mr. James was, the adventurer, pacing our small room or even sitting or standing at his desk—I could imagine him in the role, and my ambition increased with each new revelation, each new discovery.
It was inspiring to hear him talk of his two main characters—Nick Dormer, painter and politician, and the beautiful actress, Miriam—who, against all odds, fell in love. Mr. James seemed almost to be channelling his actress’s quandary, with his—or was it her?—impassioned speeches:
“Capital S She is in the uplifted state to which sacrifices and submissions loom large Comma, but loom so just because they must write sympathy Comma, write passion Comma, large Full Stop.”
I felt that, without being aware of it, Mr. James this time was speaking directly to me and my aspirations: art, passion, sympathy—What wasn’t I capable of?! Those words made me wonder what sacrifices I might have to make for the life of writing.
He paused, his hand in mid-air, as if he were an orchestra conductor stopping in mid-beat. “Miss Bosanquet, it seems you’re so attentive that you hear my voice drop for each parenthetical phrase, and you catch the silent beats in a compound sentence. I think I don’t need to dictate each and every comma but only the other punctuation and unusual commas. And a full stop surely alerts you to a capital for the next word.” With that, he went on:
“Her measure of what she would be capable of for him Dash—capable, that is, of Underline not asking of him Dash—will depend on what he shall ask of Underline her, but she has no fear of not being able to satisfy him Comma, . . .”
He paused, and I thought to myself: Ah! If only life could be like that.
But there was no time to think, for he continued:
“. . . even to the point of Quotation “chucking End Quotation” for him, if need be, that artistic identity of her own which she has begun to build up Full Stop.”
I felt a little shiver of apprehension and typed to the end of the page.
2
“In the Cage”
August 1907
The action of the drama is simply the girl’s “subjective” adventure—that of her quite definitely winged intelligence; just as the catastrophe, just as the solution, depends on her winged wit.
—Henry James
Preface to “In the Cage” The New York Edition, volume 11
It was no accident that Henry James and I met in the summer of 1907, though I had known nothing of him beyond the revelation of his novels and tales. That heavy morning in August 1907, as I sat in a top-floor office near Whitehall, compiling a very full index to the “Report of the Royal Commission on Coast Erosion,” my ears were struck by the astonishing sound of passages from “The Ambassadors” being dictated to a young typist. Neglecting my Blue-book, I turned around to watch the typewriting-machine operator ticking off those splendid sentences, which seemed to be at least as much of a surprise to her as they were to me.
When my bewilderment had broken into a question, I learnt that the novelist, Henry James, was on the point of returning from Italy, that he had asked to be provided with an amanuensis to typewrite his dictations, and that the lady at the typewriter was making acquaintance with his style. Without any hopeful design of supplanting her, I lodged an immediate petition that I might be allowed the next opportunity of filling the post, supposing she should ever abandon it. I was told, to my amazement, that I need not wait. The established candidate was not enthusiastic about the prospect before her and was even genuinely relieved to look in another direction. If I set about practising on a Remington typewriting machine at once, I could be interviewed by Henry James himself as soon as he arrived in London. Within an hour, I had begun work on the machine.
Of
