著者

出原 博明 Hiroaki DEHARA

雑誌

英米評論 = ENGLISH REVIEW (ISSN:09170200)

巻号頁・発行日

no.11, pp.93-120, 1996-12-20

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The purpose of this paper is to make clear the relation and meaning of the countryhouse at Gardencourt to Isabel Archer. Into the story come a number of houses, but only four of them actually concern the heroine; they are the countryhouse at Gardencourt, Isabel's grandmother's house in Albany, and Osmond's lodging places in Florence and Rome respectively. Osmond's houses are much more refined and decorated than the other two. However, they are closed to the world. For instance, his villa in Florence is described as 'having heavy lids but no eyes', and his Palazzo Roccanera in Rome, as 'the house of suffocation.' The American house in Albany is not open to the world, either. The way Isabel lives there is to enclose herself to the corner of a room and devote herself to reading books and reverie, without opening its door which would give access to the outside. Mr. Touchett's estate at Gardencourt is not very closed to the world though it makes much of privacy. It shows no decadence but religious aspiration after Heaven, one of the characteristics of Gothic architecture. It was built under Edward the 6th, of early Tudor style, honoured by the great Elizabeth's overnight stay, bruised in Cromwell's wars, and remodelled in the 18th century. The house may tell a lot about its master. Mr. Touchett is mentally healthy though he is fatally ill. He preserves his identity as an American well, both in his appearances and frame of mind. His estate, with its aestheticism, its honourable history, its religious symbolism of early Tudor style, and without any decoration of vanity, suggests the master's way of life, and that of Ralph, his son, who, cynical, is also mentally healthy in spite of his crucial illness. Mr. Osmond has completely lost his identity as an American and he belongs nowhere. Neither his looks nor his spirit holds any nationality. He is rootless. Osmond's villa in Florence and his Palazzo Roccanera in Rome represent what their master is; he, who is an egotistic aesthete, sensitive and clever, turns his back on the real world and collects curios; he is a snob to a T, full of pretension and vanity. Osmond, who is nearly 20 years older than Isabel, entraps her into marrying him and encloses her in his Palazzo Roccanera as if she were one of his collected curios. When Ralph's illness becomes critical, Isabel returns to Gardencourt to see him, in the teeth of her husband's threats. One of her motives for this is to be reconciled with him, that is, to confess to him that her married life is miserable and that she was wrong in marrying Osmond against Ralph's objection. Another motive to drive her into returning there is her nostalgia for Gardencourt. Psychologically speaking, Gardencourt could be a real home for her. Only this place makes her feel herself most relaxed, and enlivened. This is the place from which she jumps into the abysses of life, and comes back again, exhausted with its hardships. Now she is a grown-up woman, mentally well developed, quite different from that romantic girl who had very little knowledge of real life when she showed herself to us for the first time at Gardencourt several years ago. She likes Gardencourt best of all the houses in the story, feeling a greatest affinity for it. However, Gardencourt is not hers legally, and so it is very difficult for such a self-reliant woman as she to indulge herself with Ralph's kindness and live there for ever. As it is, she has to return to Rome, partly to defend herself against Casper Goodwood, her persevering wooer. Yet, Gardencourt remains in her mind an affinity most comfortable and most soothing. Even Mme Merle, who is Osmond's mistress-conspirator, confesses to Isabel that dear old Gardencourt is the house in which she would have liked best to live.