Daisy Miller

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.