Rating: 
Summary: An engaging story.
Review: "Daisy Miller" is a small classic that loses its risqué themes in today's society. It's an uncomplicated book to read with interesting phrases, which are explained in the back of the novella. Without a lot of detail, one must use their imagination greatly. Nonetheless, it's attention grabbing. I recommend.
Rating:
Summary: An engaging story.
Review: "Daisy Miller" is a small classic that loses its risqué themes in today's society. It's an uncomplicated book to read with interesting phrases, which are explained in the back of the novella. Without a lot of detail, one must use their imagination greatly. Nonetheless, it's attention grabbing. I recommend.
Rating:
Summary: An engaging story.
Review: "Daisy Miller" is a small classic that loses its risqué themes in today's society. It's an uncomplicated book to read with interesting phrases, which are explained in the back of the novella. Without a lot of detail, one must use their imagination greatly. Nonetheless, it's attention grabbing. I recommend.
Rating:
Summary: "Classic" Stepping Stone
Review: A delightful, quick read. "Daisy Miller" is a great introduction to American Realism. It is most interesting to read Henry James' comments on American innocence vs. European "cultural superiority." Allows for a catalyst to examine how America has evolved in world social position.
Rating:
Summary: A little James book
Review: A good prelude to "The American" this is by no means James' definitive novel, and yet it was his first commercial success. A small gem, suitable for an afternoon read over tea. If you haven't read James before, this is an easy and delightful introduction.
Rating: 
Summary: Cutting Out Daisy
Review: American Society in the mid 19th century operated under a strict
code of moral values, which were scrupulously observed while traveling abroad. Responsible women were constantly on the alert to protect young ladies from predatory Europeans, for it was a recognized international scam to marry American money. Society dowagers and conscientious mothers artfully contrived to both Exhibit their eligible daughters and yet Protect them--their reputations as well as their persons. (To be culturally honest, there were some American girls who went abroad seeking to marry Titles.) This novella in two parts is narrated by a pleasant and decent American youth who has been living and stuyding in Siwtzerland for some years. Instantly charmed by a very pretty American flirt, whose precocious little brother he's just met, the naive protagonist seeks every legitimate means to make her acquaintance and enjoy more of her company. Miss Daisy Miller certainly turns heads abroad, but she is playful and coy--enjoying the game of tormenting her beaus. The plot progresses as the unnamed hero gradually realizes that his divine Daisy does not radiate a positive reputation, for hostesses in Switzerland and later in Rome begin to shun her. Adding insult to inury, they actually warn him about her. How can he compete with her latest conquest, a handsome and indolent Latin Lover? Daisy ignores all sincere attempts to deflect her from her headstrong course of social ruin. Her mother seems utterly indifferent to her daughter's fate--demonstrating ineffective parenting skills with her horrid son as well. All of which leaves readers wondering how naive, stupid or shallow this socialite truly is. Like the governess in James' TURN OF THE SCREW, Daisy projects conflicting opinions about her personality. What terrible price will she pay for toying with men's hearts and flaunting social customs abroad? This comes across as a serious cautionary tale.
Rating:
Summary: An American in Europe
Review: As I read Henry James' novella "Daisy Miller," I found myself reminded of Anthony Minghella's film "The Talented Mr. Ripley," starring Matt Damon. Both the novella and the film tell the stories of Americans living luxurious lives in Europe. Both stories also deal with the issue of social unacceptability, and are haunted by the aura of sexual transgression. James' novella was first published in 1878, making it an early work in the author's illustrious literary career. "Daisy" opens in Switzerland, where Winterbourne, a young American man, meets the title character. An American girl who is described as "an extraordinary mixture of innocence and crudity," Daisy becomes a troublesome figure for the snobby community of Americans abroad. Some of James' social satire strikes me as rather dated, and I found the conclusion of the tale somewhat unsatisfying. Still, "Daisy" is a well-written tale that, on the whole, remains a good read today. And Daisy herself is a curiously compelling character whose story invites both a serious feminist analysis, as well as an analysis based in economic and class issues. Recommended as a companion text: "Strange Pilgrims," Gabriel Garcia Marquez' collection of stories about Latin Americans in Europe for various reasons.
Rating: 
Summary: A Masterful Sadness.
Review: As is often the case for Henry James, there is scarcely a detail of his work that can be made better somehow. DAISY MILLER: A STUDY, 1878, is among the principal novellas of history and literature. Very simply, the story involves a young girl Daisy Miller, wandering through Europe, and from America. She is sensitive and capricious. Her ways attract attention, such that perhaps she appears a lustrous woman of carnal desires, or disrespectful to cultures not her own, or stupid. At any event, she catches the eye of another tourist, Mr. Winterbourne, a "nice guy" who not unlike the nice guys of our own world lucks out. He does not get Daisy, but watches as she kisses another and loses herself to unappreciatve men. She does this from anger, resentment, and want of attention. She becomes a symbol of many things, and in the end she dies. The book has been debated for decades. The dialogue is so well crafted as to be sacred. No further editing of this story is possible, for James took very great pains to edit his work multiple times over. And here, we see a flow of talking and happenings that seem to real to even be on the page. As for instance the communication of Mr. Winterbourne and Daisy's little brother (I believe). The little boys talks, and behaves, as a little boy would. And, Mr. Winterbourne likewise behaves as a young man would to a young boy. Greatest of all are the marvellous dialogues between Daisy and Mr. Winterbourne. They flirt at times, and one feels Winterbourne's longing for her. They feel his sadness, a real sadness, as when she is not feeling for him nearly as deeply. I likened myself to to the man. I am glad to know that Mr. James was credited as having been "the Master."
Rating:
Summary: "Classic" Stepping Stone
Review: Daisy is an awkward and culturally embarrassing character- but what would one expect from Henry James? The dedicated expatriate and sexually repressed author had as is logical, much ambivalence about the nature of American innocence and social ignorance and the manner that it both outshone and was dimmed by European codes of courting and displays of youthful romance. Daisy is a tragedy in part because of her mother's extreme passivity and inability to read cues from the environment that she visited for all the wrong reasons. Similarly, though Daisy has some passion for the landscape and sites; her own interests are primarily for attention and male reactions to her attempts to allure and confuse. The hero is a sorrowful figure who is drawn to the young woman primarily for her appearance and later out of some romantic/protective impulse. In Europe, this American upperclass bachelor has languished within an unfulfilling and far from illustrious lifestyle. He is boringly European and less and less American in his vitality.
Ironic today, in the face of multicultural and global involvements to think of the huge walls between the Americans and Europeans- yet for James and his contemporaries it was a compelling issue. The other issues- that would be James' own; are sidelines to his exquisite writing and capacity to leave the reader to meditate and return to his tales and their intentions.
Rating:
Summary: Youth and Americans in Europe
Review: Daisy is an awkward and culturally embarrassing character- but what would one expect from Henry James? The dedicated expatriate and sexually repressed author had as is logical, much ambivalence about the nature of American innocence and social ignorance and the manner that it both outshone and was dimmed by European codes of courting and displays of youthful romance. Daisy is a tragedy in part because of her mother's extreme passivity and inability to read cues from the environment that she visited for all the wrong reasons. Similarly, though Daisy has some passion for the landscape and sites; her own interests are primarily for attention and male reactions to her attempts to allure and confuse. The hero is a sorrowful figure who is drawn to the young woman primarily for her appearance and later out of some romantic/protective impulse. In Europe, this American upperclass bachelor has languished within an unfulfilling and far from illustrious lifestyle. He is boringly European and less and less American in his vitality.
Ironic today, in the face of multicultural and global involvements to think of the huge walls between the Americans and Europeans- yet for James and his contemporaries it was a compelling issue. The other issues- that would be James' own; are sidelines to his exquisite writing and capacity to leave the reader to meditate and return to his tales and their intentions.
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