o The tragic gypsy dancer heroine of Victor Hugo’s 1831 French novel about fifteenth-century Paris, Notre-Dame de Paris (The Hunchback of Notre Dame).
p In touch, in connection with; a state in which mesmeric action can be exercised by one person on another (Oxford English Dictionary).
q Dressed up with vulgar finery.
r Those who deal in quack remedies.
s Character based on the nineteenth-century spiritualist Cora L. V. Hatch, one of whose lectures James attended in 1863.
t Possibly a reference to Brook Farm, a Fourieresque community in Roxbury (see chapter IV, note 3, and chapter V, note 1).
u Reference to literary or political salons.
v American travel writer and translator, famous for his English rendition of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s Faust in the early 1870s.
w Heavy curtains used as doors (French).
x Reduction to the absurd (Latin): disproof of a hypothesis by revealing the absurdity or incongruity of its logical conclusion.
y Greek biographer of the first century A.D.
z Shade or tone (French); figuratively, a subtle or slight variation or difference in meaning, expression, feeling, etc.
aa Range, span (French); figuratively, import or consequence.
ab Social midst (French).
ac Of the Chinese (French); here, in Chinese style.
ad Outbreaks.
ae Dabbler (French); here, a lover of the arts, or someone who has a superficial interest in them.
af Island in Acadia National Park, off the coast of Maine.
ag Child of theater or circus parents (French); one who follows in parents’ professional footsteps.
ah Women’s apartments in a household; any building set apart for women.
ai On the whole (Latin); totally, completely.
aj Private life (French).
ak Reference to the composers Franz Schubert (Austrian, 1797-1828) and Felix Mendelssohn (German, 1809-1847).
al Sixteenth-century (Italian); art in Italy in the 1500s was marked by a reversion to classical forms.
am Small curios (French).
an Prophetess, fortune-teller, witch.
ao Outcome or conclusion (French); in literary terms, the unraveling of a plot.
ap Literally, protected (French); a favorite; here, one whose career is sponsored by someone of influence.
aq Newspaper founded in 1841 by Horace Greeley (1811-1872), an American editor and politician who advocated social reform; a member of his editorial staff was the Transcendentalist Margaret Fuller (see Introduction).
ar A consolidation of the city’s principal social welfare agencies.
as Conservative German newspaper founded in 1874.
at Recurring element in a work of art (French).
au Common table for guests at a hotel or restaurant (French).
av Glass of beer or wine (German).
aw At full length (Latin).
ax Ethan Allen Andrews (1787-1858) and Solomon Stoddard (1800-1847), authors of a popular book of Latin grammar.
ay One-on-one, private conversation (French).
az Female improviser (French).
ba North-south thoroughfare that runs through the center of Manhattan; at the time of the novel, very upscale and lined with expensive homes.
bb Towns in Middlesex County, in eastern Massachusetts.
bc Arcadia, a mountain area in southern Greece; in this context, represents pastoral paradise.
bd Roman goddess of handicrafts, the arts, wisdom, and war.
be Three of the most renowned universities in the world; as mentioned here they are, respectively, in England (founded in the twelfth century), Germany (1737), and Italy (1222).
bf Reference to Gore Hall, where Harvard’s library was first housed; the building was a simplified imitation of an edifice at King’s College of Cambridge University in England (see chapter XXV, note 1).
bg Authoritative body of Jewish civil and ceremonial traditional law.
bh Small, two-person sofa (French).
bi Keeping secret.
bj Chore, thankless task (French).
bk An affront to her slighted beauty (Latin); a hanging look. The reference is to an episode in the epic Aeneid by the Roman poet Virgil (70-19 B.C.) in which Juno, wife of the god Jupiter, is angry when Paris, who has been charged with choosing the most beautiful goddess among three (the other contenders are Venus and Minerva), awards the prize to Venus. This contest was a prelude to the Trojan War (see chapter XII, note 2).
bl Evening party (French).
bm Foremost and largest restaurant in the United States in the nineteenth century, named for and operated by Swiss immigrant Lorenzo Delmonico.
bn Explanation (French).
bo I have resigned myself (French).
bp A top venue for theater and opera from 1854 to 1926, located in New York City at Fourteenth Street and Irving Place.
bq Menu.
br Atlantic Ocean inlet in southeastern Massachusetts that extends to the base of the Cape Cod peninsula.
bs Oil painting (c.1513) by Raphael that depicts the Madonna and Child floating on clouds. It is now in Dresden, Germany.
bt Also the title of an 1883 novel by William Dean Howells, a close friend of Henry James.
bu House constructed of wood.
bv Town in eastern Massachusetts at the northern tip of Cape Cod; in the nineteenth century, an active whaling and fishing port.
bw One who poses (French; here, referring to a female); a show-off.
bx That’s all I need! (French).
by Passages or openings in an ancient amphitheater leading to or from the seats.
bz Pagan Egyptian Neoplatonist philosopher and mathematician (A.D. 370-415); she was killed by a fanatical Christian mob.
Henry James, The Bostonians
(Series: # )
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