Suspended Affect in Henry James's The Golden Bowl

Abstract: The last major work of fiction completed in Henry James’ career as an author, The Golden Bowl sits apart in the context of his oeuvre. In the novel, narrated action has migrated away from the description of exterior events toward a style of indirection, implication, and a focus on the inner workings of its characters. The essay argues that The Golden Bowl stages a suspended affect that denies narrative closure in a strategy on James’s part to emphasize the versatility of the novel form. By contextualizing this phenomenon alongside contemporaneous and more modern theories of emotion, the essay contends that the suspended affect staged in the novel results from negative emotions owing to ambiguous social relationships as well as characters’ difficulties in translating and verbalizing embodied emotions that are ultimately irretrievable.