...though leaving him always to remark, portentously, on his probably having formed a relation, his probably enjoying a consciousness, unique in the experience of man. People enough, first and last, had been in terror of apparitions, but who had ever before so turned the tables and become himself, in the apparitional world, an incalculable terror? He might have found this sublime had he quite dared to think of it; but he didn't too much insist, truly, on that side of his privilege.

As more material became available to scholars including the diaries of contemporaries and hundreds of affectionate and sometimes erotic letters written by James to younger men the picture of neurotic celibacy gave way to a portrait of a closeted homosexual although as author Terry Eagleton has stated ". Strether is to bring the young man back to the family business but he encounters unexpected complications. James was one of the great letter-writers of any era.

The concept of a good or bad novel is judged solely upon whether the author is good or bad. He is primarily known for the series of novels in which he portrays the encounter of Americans with Europe and Europeans.