The Beast in the Jungle, Henry James
The Beast in the Jungle, Henry James
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The Beast in the Jungle

Author: Henry James

Narrator: Kris Dyer

Abridged: 2 hr 12 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 02/17/2020

Categories: Fiction, Classic


Synopsis

Bachelor John Marcher is haunted by the premonition that something terrible lies in store for him, like a "beast in the jungle" lying in wait. So he spends his life in idleness, unable to carry out his dreams or desires, while his friend May Bartram, curious to see how this spectacular fate will manifest, helps watch out for the arrival of the beast. The two develop a strong platonic relationship, stoked by this mystery, and gradually the best years of their life roll by, unfulfilled - lost to John's dread and fear of the unknown. Written soon after The Wings of the Dove, The Beast in the Jungle is a haunting story of crippling obsession and a life unlived.

About Henry James

American-born writer Henry James (1843–1916) authored 20 novels, 112 stories, 12 plays, and a number of literary criticisms.

James was born in New York City into a wealthy family. In his youth, James traveled back and forth between Europe and America. He studied with tutors in Geneva, London, Paris, Bologna, and Bonn. At the age of nineteen, he briefly attended Harvard Law School, but he was more interested in literature than law. James published his first short story, "A Tragedy of Errors," two years later and then devoted himself entirely to literature. In the late 1860s and early 1870s, he was a contributor to the Nation and Atlantic Monthly. His first novel, Watch and Ward, first appeared serially in the Atlantic.

After living in Paris, where he was a contributor to the New York Tribune, James moved to England. During his first years in Europe, James wrote novels that portrayed Americans living abroad. Between 1906 and 1910, he revised many of his tales and novels for the so-called New York edition of his complete works. Between 1913 and 1917, his three-volume autobiography-A Small Boy and Others, Notes of a Son and Brother, and The Middle Years (released posthumously)-was published. His last two novels, The Ivory Tower and The Sense of the Past, were left unfinished at his death.

Among James's masterpieces are Daisy Miller, The Portrait of a Lady, The Bostonians, and The Wings of the Dove. In addition, James considered his 1903 work The Ambassadors his most "perfect" work of art.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Daiton on December 03, 2024

The Beast in the Jungle: This story for me is a lesson; a lesson that holding back from opportunities, or loving someone in your life, due to the fear of it hurting you, will actually hurt you a lot more in the end. Henry James gives minimal context around the two characters that this story is center......more

Goodreads review by Roxanne on March 31, 2024

A classic for a reason...I was drawn in from the get go, undaunted by James' long paragraphs. The two person plot kept my interest in how it would end. Now, I'm excited to see the different movie renditions inspired by this tale of longing and self-denial.......more

Goodreads review by John on November 05, 2015

I took up this volume as Halloween approached and I realized I had never read James’s second most famous ghost story, “The Jolly Corner.” (I love James, but his most famous ghost story, the novella The Turn of the Screw, has always struck me as a bit of a gimmick, a work written to order for a sylla......more

Goodreads review by Mark on February 10, 2025

This is a review only for the short story “The Beast in the Jungle,” which I read because I wanted to understand its influence on Bertrand Bonello’s The Beast, a time-hopping sci-fi/romance/horror/satire/undefinable-mess-that-I-adored 2024 French film about two people’s potential love that is thwart......more

Goodreads review by David Meditationseed on June 08, 2018

“The Beast in the Jungle” A deep and subtle book, but one that requires attention and patience because of James's style, the narrative form of the time when it was written, and resembling a novel. And then a tip, in my opinion, is to find a good translation. As in other works by Henry James, for examp......more