Cover of The Beast in the Jungle by Henry James Ebook The Beast in the Jungle
Ebook · Urban Romantics

The Beast in the Jungle

Author
Henry James
Series
World Classics
Language
English
Length
56 pages
ISBN
9781909175785
Published
15 September 2012
Imprint
Urban Romantics
  • Henry James
  • love
  • fate
  • death
  • loneliness
  • secret
  • egoist
  • realism
  • tragedy
  • creativity

Description

"The Beast in the Jungle" by Henry James is a poignant novella centered on John Marcher, a man who believes he is destined for a unique and life-altering event he calls "the beast in the jungle." Throughout his life, Marcher awaits this unknown event with a mix of anticipation and dread. When he meets May Bartram, a woman who seems to share his secret, their lives become intertwined in a complex dance of missed opportunities and unspoken feelings. As time passes, Marcher's preoccupation with the anticipated event leaves him blind to the meaningful connection he could have had with May. James's evocative prose explores themes of self-absorption, missed chances, and the profound consequences of one's obsessions. "The Beast in the Jungle" serves as a haunting reflection on the human tendency to overlook the present in pursuit of elusive and imagined futures.

Author

Henry James (1843–1916) is among the supreme novelists in English — an American who made Europe his stage and consciousness his subject. In The Portrait of a Lady, The Ambassadors, and The Wings of the Dove he traced Americans abroad through drawing rooms, secrets, and moral choice with unmatched psychological precision. James wrote sentences that think: long, exacting, and alive to every shade of feeling between people.

Other editions