What Maisie Knew
by Henry James
What Maisie knows is one of James' best reflections on the rites of transition from wonder to knowledge and their certainty. The child of ruthlessly divorced parents, Maisie Farange is distinctly opening her eyes to the modern world. Mothers and fathers constantly change their wives and names, and he himself becomes the cause of all sorts of sexual intrigues of adults. In this classic story of childhood death, there is a wild comedy that owes Dickens a lot. But because James depicts a boy's ability to perform an intelligent "miracle," it evokes all the subtlety he has dedicated elsewhere to his most famous adult heroes. Neglected and exploited by everyone around her, Maisie inspires James to dwell with extreme poignancy on things that can happen between an adult and a child.
