The American in Europe
Daisy Miller is one of the first works to treat what became Henry James’s most famous theme: the international theme. James was interested in the problems that result when independent and free-spirited Americans are introduced into a European society older, more sophisticated, and more restrictive. On the one hand, James admired Europe’s centuries of tradition, its art, and its culture, and he deplored America’s rawness and vulgarity. On the other hand, he distrusted Europe as overly refined, perhaps corrupting, and he applauded American energy, optimism, and innocence.
The theme of the American in Europe has many facets in Daisy Miller: the natural versus the artificial, innocence versus knowledge, age versus youth. The characters in the story offer many variations on the theme. Daisy is a young American visiting Europe for the first time, Winterbourne a young American raised on the continent, Mrs. Costello and Mrs. Walker older Americans who have been thoroughly Europeanized. Each of them reacts to Europe and to America in different and revealing ways.
Appearance v. Reality
James shows you that the gap between what people believe to be true and the actual truth can be large. To the Europeanized Americans of Vevey and Rome, Daisy’s independence makes her appear immoral. She agrees to an unchaperoned excursion to Chillon with Winterbourne, she treats her family’s courier like a friend. She travels around Rome with known fortune hunters, flaunts her affection for Giovanelli in public, and is discovered alone with him in the Colosseum at midnight. By European standards, these actions label her a disgrace. Even Winterbourne, who at first defends Daisy as being merely ignorant of social codes rather than being deliberately immoral, becomes unable to differentiate between Daisy’s reputation and her true nature, between what appears to be immoral behavior and what is in reality only youthful, American impetuousness. He, too, judges by appearances and pays for it with the guilt he feels after Daisy’s death.
Heart v. Head
At first, Winterbourne is emotionally involved with the problems posed by Daisy’s behavior. He’s attracted to her romantically, and he wants to know that she is worthy of his affection. As the story progresses, and Daisy’s behavior seems to grow wilder, his emotional curiosity cools and becomes an intellectual curiosity. Daisy becomes a riddle he wants to solve. The final triumph of Winterbourne’s intellect over his emotions occurs when he discovers Daisy in the Colosseum with Giovanelli. His worst fears are (he thinks) confirmed. The puzzle of her character was almost too easy to figure out. He no longer feels anything for her. “It doesn’t matter” if she is engaged or not, he tells her. His callous statement provokes a bleak reply. Daisy tells him she doesn’t care if she gets Roman fever or not. It’s not until after Daisy’s death, when Winterbourne has come to understand that she would have appreciated his esteem, that he realizes what the triumph of his head over his heart has cost him.
Sacrifice
Writing to a friend about Daisy Miller, Henry James said, “The whole idea of the story is the little tragedy of a light, thin, natural, unsuspecting creature being sacrificed as it were to a social rumpus that went on quite over her head and to which she stood in no measurable relation.” Daisy is, above all else, uncultivated. She has no understanding of the implications of her behavior, and in her ignorance lies her innocence. Her rejection by American society abroad and eventually Winterbourne (beginning with the symbolic scene in the Colosseum, site of Christian martyrdom) indirectly leads to her death. Daisy is a martyr to the intolerance of Europeanized Americans.