Dostoevsky, Joyce, and God

Abstract In good Aristotelian fashion, the denouement of James’s The Ambassadors follows directly from a peripeteia-accompanied-by-anagnorisis when its plot is at the point of greatest complication. These occur in a linked sequence of three chapters, immediately after Lambert Strether has finally decided, and acted-at the likely price of his own future security and possible happiness-to support Chad Newsome’s inclination toward Madame de Vionnet. The first of the linked three, Chapter XXX, presents Strether taking a day of respite in the country. The chapter ends abruptly; and XXXI begins (with the words “what he saw “: anagnorisis) when he comes upon the couple-who pretend that they too are down only for the day. The “sequel “ (James’s word) to that blatant coincidence develops directly. In XXXII Madame de Vionnet asks Strether to call, and he learns whom he must really try to protect, who is the spider in the relationship and who the fly.