Alice doesn't live here: Alice James and literary talent

Alice James moves to England for the last years of her life (she's only about 40) and two weird things happen: she gets much, much more ill with whatever her mysterious almost paralytic malady may be - some form of severe depression it seems, based on what info we can gleam from her own accounts and sometimes Henry's - but she also notes that she feels much more at home and comfortable in England - as if in America everyone expects you, or her, to be hale and hearty and ambitious. In England, she's among the droll, the ill, the sedentary, and is not seen as so exceptional or burdensome, or at least that's how she feels. She does impose quite a burden on her caretaker/companions, Henry J and her best friend, possible sometime lover, Katharine Loring; part of this section of Strouse's bio of AJ concerns the various quackeries summoned to treat AJ - and Strouse notes a pattern - she is at first in thrall to the doctors but eventually turns bitterly against them as they fail to help her. Strouse as is her wont puts a pop-psychology spin on this: she falls in love with the doctor, a strong man and the only man to touch her body in adult life, but that begins to rage against them, as part of her rage against man the oppressor; she ties this into feminist and suffragist movements and policies of the day, and certainly AJ was aware of these movements and even participated to the degree she was able. Why wouldn't she think of men as the oppressors? They were! But to ascribe her illness to a psycho-political cause seems to me to be a stretch - she was really sick with something, no question. The highlight of this section is that we again see how sharp and funny she was as an observer and commentator; her acidic descriptions of friends and acquaintances are terrific and cruel - and makes us think that she definitely had a great talent that was dormant and un-nurtured. I don't quite accept that this was so because she was the only daughter in the family; I think it's more straightforward - she just didn't have the mental or physical strength to make something of her talent - as is true of many people in all times and classes, especially I would say the working classes, where the demands of life make it pretty hard to roam around among European salons and making mental notes - just as in sports, in literature there's a lot more involved than just talent, and each of us knows I'm sure some fine writers who let their talent lie for whatever reason as well as some incredibly mediocre talents that become ensconced for one reason or another.