The Complete Letters of Henry James, 1878-1880

Containing letters written between October 3, 1878, and August 30, 1879, this volume of The Complete Letters of Henry James reveals Henry James establishing control of his writing career and finding confidence in himself not only as a professional author on both sides of the Atlantic but also as an important social figure in London.

In this volume of 114 letters, of which 58 are published for the first time, we see James learning to negotiate, pitting one publisher against another, and working to secure simultaneous publication in the United States and England. He establishes a working relationship with Frederick Macmillan and with the Macmillan publishing house, cultivates reviewers, basks in the success—and notoriety—of his novella Daisy Miller, and visits Alfred Tennyson and George Eliot, among others. James also produces essays on political subjects and continues to publish reviews and travel essays. Perhaps most important, James negotiates terms for and begins planning The Portrait of a Lady.

Henry James (1843–1916) wrote short stories, plays, literary criticism, and travel essays and is most famous for his many novels, which include The Portrait of a Lady, The Bostonians, The Ambassadors, and The Golden Bowl.

Pierre A. Walker is a professor of English at Salem State University. He is the editor of Henry James on Culture: Collected Essays on Politics and the American Social Scene (Nebraska, 1999).
Greg W. Zacharias is a professor of English at Creighton University, where he directs the Center for Henry James Studies. He is the editor of A Companion to Henry James and coeditor of Tracing Henry James. Michael Anesko is a professor of English at Pennsylvania State University. He is the author of Monopolizing the Master: Henry James and the Politics of Modern Literary Scholarship.