Trapping the Gaze: Objects of Desire in James\u27s Early and late Fiction

The object of desire in James\u27s fiction is an ironic construct designed to expose the inevitable deformations of the gaze. What we long for--to be seen (understood) from our own perspective or, conversely, to understand another from his or her own perspective--is impossible. Instead there is always a gap, an abyss, between what we see and what we imagine or wish to be true about the Other. For Jacques Lacan, the gaze is, simply, the subject sustaining itself in the function of desire (Four Fundamental Concepts 84). In James\u27s fiction, the powerful impulse to create an ideal and to believe that one\u27s ideal is real or true is undermined as characters confront the deeper truth of their subjective shaping of reality