I believe I must have first read Henry James at university but I have no recollection of it. Then, I remember finding What Maisie Knew in a second hand bookshop and after that I was gifted The Aspern Papers. I like the elaborate sentences and sturdily built characters – each with their very own idiosyncrasies. I have been slowly amassing James’ works and have delighted in Colm Tóibín’s The Master. Nevertheless, I only read The Portrait of a Lady last year and this mainly because I bought John Banville’s Mrs Osmond and wanted to be acquainted with the ‘prequel’.

I like to interchange contemporary books with the classics and so when Washington Square recently arrived in post, sent to me by a friend, it presented itself as a suitable next reading option. It is a slim piece, less than two-hundred pages long and twenty pages in I am already captivated by the heroine – Catherine Sloper – who can be most generously and without slightest over- or understatement described as ordinary in all aspects. This, for me, is what makes her stand out. We all hope or believe that we are special and extraordinary. This conviction is usually supported by works of art capturing and representing extraordinary characters. However, somewhere deep down we may be well aware that the ‘extraordinariness’ is a myth and we are each just ordinary in a somewhat particular way.

He [Catherine’s father] had moments of irritation at having produced a commonplace child, and he even went so far at times as to take a certain satisfaction in the thought that his wife had not lived to find her out. He was naturally slow in making this discovery himself, and it was not till Catherine had become a young lady grown that je regarded the matter as settled. He gave her the benefit of great many doubts; he was in no haste to conclude. Mrs Penniman [Catherine’s aunt] frequently assured him that his daughter had a delightful nature; but he knew how to interpret this assurance. It meant, to his sense, that Catherine was not wise enough to discover that her aunt was a goose – a limitation of mind that could not fail to be agreeable to Mrs Penniman.

I skipped the ‘Introduction’ as it warned of detailing the plot and so am not fully aware of what is going to happen to Catherine – a plain heiress to a fortune – but I will be rooting for her.

[…]

I have tried to drag this book out as much as I could as the steady and even tone that captures and reflects its heroine’s main qualities felt soothing and restorative. The sentences seemed flowing through Catherine and carrying her on their waves at the same time.

Catherine does not break out of her ordinariness, however, her steadfastness and solidity within her circumstances make her extraordinary as she seems to conduct herself contrary to what the reader is expecting. Despite the use of my adjectives making her look like a statue she is not immovable. Although she seems stubborn, she undergoes changes and developments that remain invisible to those around her as they fail to look at her in a new light and continue to interpret her actions and inactions in the context of their own perceptions and interpretations of her.

I came to appreciate and admire Catherine more and more as she took shape through her quiet strength and perseverance. Her mild, kind, almost extravagant in its enormity, consideration for her father, aunt and lover, each of whom unashamedly and selfishly only pursued his or her own interests, gains unexpected momentum towards the end when it becomes clear that she unwittingly outwitted them all.

Catherine standing tall, vivid and content at the end presented a welcome, albeit, unexpected conclusion, one that will stay with me for a while. This certainly is a book that will be worth returning to as I suspect I have not fathomed its depths.