ABSTRACT
Between 1896 and 1899, Henry James published a series of remarkable novels and stories which are told primarily from the point of view of a girl or a young woman: The Other House, What Maisie Knew, The Turn of the Screw, The Spoils of Poynton, ‘In the Cage’ and The Awkward Age. According to Leon Edel, the series belongs to a period of experimentation in James’s career, between the humiliating collapse of his theatrical venture in 1895, and the triumphant inauguration of his ‘major phase’ in 1900, when he began work on The Ambassadors (Edel 1969, pp. 246-50). During this period, Edel suggests, James was preparing the ground for the achievement of the late novels, extending and refining his narrative technique, attempting the unusual.
