Book Review: House of Wits: An Intimate Portrait of the James

House of Wits: An Intimate Portrait of the James Family by Paul Fisher Little, Brown, 704pp, £16.99 Review by LESLEY McDOWELL SO MANY QUESTIONS, SO FEW answers: the life of Henry James, a writer who specialised in ambiguity both personally and professionally, has puzzled biogra phers and critics for decades. Was he gay or just shy of sex? Did his close female friend Constance Fenimore Woolson kill herself because he'd rejected her love or mocked her writing, or was it nothing to do with him? In choosing as his subject the entire James family, not just its most famous son, or the elder, prestigious psychologist brother, William, Paul Fisher has shifted the focus from these age-old questions to posit some new ones, and it's to his credit that in doing so he manages to resist falling foul of the most Freudian of family... [read full story]