ces? The
subject of the book is in the question. First of all we see a highly
sophisticated circle of men and women, who seem so well practised in
the art of living that they could never be taken by surprise. Life in
their hands has been refined to a process in which nothing appears to
have been left to chance. Their intelligence accounts for everything;
they know where they are, they know what they want, and under a
network of discretion which they all sustain they thoroughly
understand each other. It is a charmed world, altogether
self-contained, occupying a corner of modern London. It is carefully
protected within and without; and yet oddly enough there is one quite
common and regular contingency for which it is not prepared at all.
Its handling of life proceeds smoothly so long as all the men and
women together are on a level of proficiency, all alike experienced in
the art; and they can guard themselves against intruders from
elsewhere. But periodically it must happen that their young grow up;
the daughter of the house reaches the "awkward age," becomes suddenly
too old for the school-room and joins her elders below. Then comes the
difficulty; there is an interval in which she is still too young for
the freedom of her elders' style, and it looks as though she might
disconcert them not a little, sitting there with wide eyes. Do they
simply disregard her and continue their game as before? Do they try to
adapt their style to her inexperience? Apparently they have no theory
of their proper course; the difficulty seems to strike them afresh,
every time that it recurs. In other such worlds, not of modern London,
it is foreseen and provided for; the young woman is married and
launched at once, there is no awkward age. But here and now--or rather
here and _then_, in the nineteenth century--it makes a real little
situation, and this is the subject of Henry James's book.

It is clearly dramatic; it is a clean-cut situation, raising the
question of its issue, and by answering the question the subject is
treated. What will these people do, how will they circumvent this
awkwardness? That is what the book is to show--action essentially, not
the picture of a character or a state of mind. Mind and character
enter into it, of course, as soon as the situation is particularized;
the girl becomes an individual, with her own outlook, her own way of
reaching a conclusion, and her point of view must then be understood.
But whatever it m