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This study examines that 'silence' as an instrument of communication is often more effective and important in Henry James's The Portrait of a Lady (1880) than verbalization. 'Silence' is defined here as the lack of speech, the locus of silence where speech is delayed, or concealed by the narrator of by the character. The lack is filled in by gestures, facial expressions or eye contacts.
James uses silence not only as a medium of significant expression but also as a strategy for structuring the plot. In The Portrait of a Lady, the element of silence-- silent, implied gestures, the fragmented and uncompleted speech, and mute, static objects are her food for imagination. Whereas such figures as Osmond, Merle try to use silence as tools of manipulation. They conceal their reality beneath the brilliant surface. Here the reader must commit himself to active reading with imagination, thereby being aware of the questions the text raises. Finally James lets Isabel Archer have “a fine consciousness” after passing through the suffering and recognition.
James frequently and effectively uses silence The Ambassadors, and The Golden Bowl which contributes to the development of method of such modern novelists as James Joyce, Virginia Woolf.