The Madonna of the Future

Henry James wrote the long short story "The Madonna of the Future" (1873) at the age of thirty, but although it features his early, relatively straightforward style, it is subtle in the way it combines its themes: America's discovery of Europe, the American artist's particular challenges, the representations of woman in art (as contrasted with actual women), and the plight of the cerebral and tentative artist who wraps himself in preparatory notes and theorizing, afraid to begin the work which summons him now. The narrator is a Mr. H-, an American, "a clever man who had seen much of men and manners," who relates an after-dinner story of an artist he met during his first trip to Italy. While taking a walk his first night in Florence, he encounters Theobald, another American, a painter, who guides him-on this night and subsequent nights-to some of the great artistic wonders of the city.