Reciprocity Of Speech In Henry James Brooksmith

Henry James’ Brooksmith is the narration by an unnamed character about his experiences with a servant names Brooksmith during and after his conversations with Brooksmith’s master Mr Offord. In the story, Brooksmith starts off as more of a background character to the narrators and Mr. Offord’s conversations. But as the story goes on, Mr.Offord becomes ill, ultimately bringing Brooksmith into the story’s spotlight. Later on in the story we see the death of Mr.Offord, and then begins the decline of Brooksmith that will lead to his speculated death.This story is full of clever devices, such as a connected sentence structure, the use of an anonymous narrator, and a theme of “reciprocity” of speech and its effects on Brooksmith, that make it the story it is. In this story Henry James uses a theme of Anonymous narration. James seems to use this so that we can see the story, but out of the perspective of the named characters. The anonymous narrator also prevents the readers from forming any sort of connection with him, and therefore leads the readers focus to Brooksmith 's story instead. The narrator also acts unbiased, and therefore leaving it up to the reader …show more content…
Çiftçi says that this causes the reciprocity of speech to be essential to the continuing narration of the story. As the reader goes through the story the roles of the three main characters are played out. Mr. Offord is the owner of the house in which the conversations took place, Brooksmith is the servant, and the unknown narrator is a mutual friend of each. Çiftçi says that the theme of “reciprocity of Speech” is associated to the concepts of “center and Limit” and that those two concepts represent the two characters that keep the permanent environment of the home. The theme of reciprocity takes hold after the death of Mr. Offord. (Çiftçi