Washington Square
About this audiobook
Penguin Classics presents Henry James' Washington Square, adapted for audio and available as a digital download as part of the Penguin English Library series. Read by William Hope.
"Why, you must take me or leave me ... You can't please your father and me both; you must choose between us"
When timid and plain Catherine Sloper acquires a dashing and determined suitor, her father, convinced that the young man is nothing more than a fortune-hunter, decides to put a stop to their romance. Torn between her desire to win her father's love and approval and her passion for the first man who has ever declared his love for her, Catherine faces an agonising dilemma, and becomes all too aware of the restrictions that others seek to place on her freedom. James's masterly novel deftly interweaves the public and private faces of nineteenth-century New York society; it is also a deeply moving study of innocence destroyed.
Part of a series of vintage recordings taken from the Penguin Archives. Affordable, collectable, quality productions - perfect for on-the-go listening.
About the author
Henry James was born in 1843 in New York City. The son of a prominent theologian and philosopher, the young James's intellectual upbringing enabled him to travel widely, studying in New York, London, Paris, Bologna and Geneva. He briefly attended Harvard Law School in 1862 before choosing to dedicate himself instead to writing and literary criticism, with his first short story, A Tragedy of Error, published at the age of twenty-one. Well acquainted with Europe, he moved more permanently to England, living in London and later Sussex. A prominent literary figure and noted socialite, he admitted to having accepted 107 invitations in the winter of 1878-9 alone. James became a British citizen in 1915, received the Order of Merit in 1916, and died that year at the age of seventy-two.
Daisy Miller and The Turn of the Screw, The Portrait of a Lady and The Wings of the Dove are also published in the Penguin English Library.
