Daisy Miller is an 1878 novella by Henry James. I posted here a photo of a
sample cover of it that could give us an idea of who Daisy Miller was.
After reading there are some questions that would be very helpful
to analyze the novel in the context of our Journey in Literature class. A tourist is
someone who visits a place largely driven by the promotion and publicity that a
certain place gets throughout the world. These people visit a limited
number of places and/or places that are readily prepared to receive tourists. Tourists try to escape they reality and they
go through a certain place without really taking the time of analyzing the
culture, the problems, the costumes or the reality of the people that live
there. On the other hand a traveler
merges in between the people of the places he travels and becomes one of them.
To me a traveler is someone who goes all around different places
developing his/her own culture as a mixture of everything that he has gathered
along his journey. Based on these
definitions, I would classify Daisy Miller as a tourist. She was originally from New York and when she
went to Europe she simply let go. She
didn’t mind what locals where saying about her flirting with many men and being
all by herself, without chaperone, late at night. This can be shown in two quotes I selected
from the text. In the first quote Daisy
says: "I don't to do
anything improper. There's an easy way to settle it." She states that she doesn’t believe that what
she was doing with the European men was wrong at all showing how she was in an
escape from her reality, not minding what consequences would it bring
after. The second quote shows the
respond from Daisy after Mrs. Walker confronts her for her actions: "I never heard anything so stiff! If
this is improper, Mrs. Walker, then I am all improper, and you must give me up.
Goodbye; I hope you'll have a lovely ride!”
Both quotes demonstrate how Daisy Miller keeps her beliefs very strong
and doesn’t show any concern if her actions disrupt the rules established by
the society she is visiting, thus fitting the definition of a tourist.
Along the story we can observe some
incidents where othering is tangible. At
the beginning of the story when Winterbourne meets little Randolph and he
introduces himself and his sister, he states very proudly “She is an American
girl.” Randolph also states: “I am an
American boy.” This shows a sense of
proudness and othering, trying to make his family look as important as being an
American is for him. He makes this part
of his introduction in order to state differences between the Europeans that
surround them. Another incident of othering is seen when
Winterbourne talks to his aunt about Miss Miller and she says: "They are
very common. They are the sort of
Americans that one does one's duty by not—not accepting." This demonstrates class othering; Mrs.
Costello puts herself on a higher standard than Daisy’s family and makes them
different from her. She maintains a
distance between her othering them as being “common” or low-class people. The last incident of othering I chose
corresponds to this quote by Daisy Miller: "He's an Italian. He's a great
friend of mine; he's the handsomest man in the world—except Mr. Winterbourne!
He knows plenty of Italians, but he wants to know some Americans. He thinks
ever so much of Americans. He's tremendously clever. He's perfectly
lovely!" Daisy Miller others Mr.
Giovanelli for being an Italian, and therefore being an exceptional man. She establishes a difference between men of
different nationalities and Italian men.
Daisy uses the fact of him being an Italian as an argument in favor of
her spending time with him.
This story lets us see how society
can or cannot shape somebody’s perspective.
Daisy Miller would represent an example of how the Italian society could
not shape her and instead she was showing completely American behaviors all
over the story. The fact that Daisy goes
around flirting with many men not bothering with the order the Italian society
displayed, categorizes her as a rebel of the Italian society and a perfectly
shaped American character. Her ideals
and vision of the world were very strong, not letting any foreign beliefs
interrupt hers. If we try to identify a
character that bears an opposite characterization to Daisy Miller that would be
Mrs. Walker. Her perspective is
completely shaped by the Italian society.
The way she thinks and acts towards Daisy’s actions reflect how
conservative and truthful she is to the Italian costumes. She cannot bear the idea of Daisy flirting
around with men and she really acts to denounce Daisy’s actions as wrong. Finally a character that would be in between
of Daisy Miller and Mrs. Costello would be Winterbourne. He is the perfect example of a character
whose perspective has been shaped equally by both cultures: the Italian and the
American. Even though he confronts Daisy
for her actions and tries to persuade her, he respects her decision and he even
incites her to flirt with him. He stands
between both “seas” of perspective and therefore he tends to display a
contradictory behavior.
