Henry James’s novella The Beast in the Jungle offers a striking contrast between its main characters, John Marcher and May Bartram.  For May, everyday life becomes a scene of instruction: an occasion to deepen her responsiveness to experiences of contingency, love, and death. John, by contrast, struggles to be fully present in either language or life, failing to make sense of his experiences, most poignantly his grief. John waits for the transformative arrival of something extraordinary; May waits for him to discover that the extraordinary is already here. In an age of distraction and constant digital engagement, how do we find meaning in life? What are we waiting for? And can we learn to respond more fully to experience in thought, speech, and action?

On Friday, November 13, at 12 PM, join Dr. Megan Laverty (Columbia) for this lunch discussion of Henry James’s novella as the fourth part of our Great Books for the Age of AI series this semester.