I invoked one novel of Henry James (1843 - 1916) in my "golden age" list a few weeks back. It was THE SACRED FOUNT.
Here is some Wikipedia-type stuff about it. The novel was published in 1901. It was his 16th novel. By length it might almost be considered a novella.
THE SACRED FOUNT was a departure for James, for several reasons, starting with the first person narration. Something he never had used before and never would again.
There is also the pagination. All Roman numerals, from beginning to end. One is accustomed to Roman numbers in a preface and then Arabic numerals for the volume proper. But in this case, the Romans only end when the book does (at page cxcii). The mental energy required to translate that into 192 is a small thing, but not nothing and presumably contributes to a desired effect.
The plot? As far as outward events go, the plot is simply this. Our unnamed narrator, a man, takes a train to a party, apparently held on a large estate in the countryside. On the train, and at the party over the course of a weekend, he has a lot of conversations both with and about other attendees. He forms elaborate theories about these other attendees, mostly to the effect that romantic liaisons are sapping the energy from some of them and rejuvenating others.
Who is serving as the sacred fount of libidinal energy for whom? That is the question.
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Beyond such wiki-obtainable stuff, there is the familiar Jamesian style. Early on, two characters (our narrator and a woman theorizing with him) speaking about two other characters, allows the fellow theorist to produce this gem of Jamesian dialog:
"I don't mean to say of course," she replied, "that he looks fluttered if you mention her, that he doesn't in fact look as blank as a pickpocket. But that proves nothing -- or, rather, as they're known to be always together, and she from morning till night as pointed as a hat-pin, it proves just what one sees. One simply takes it in."
With all the indirectness here, in three sentences, one gets what the novelist's philosophical brother disliked so intensely about Henry's style.
The "he" under discussion there is one Gilbert Long, whose name is the first proper name one encounters in the novel (p. ii). Long presumably looks fluttered (not "flustered") when one mentions Lady John, the "her" in question.
It seems not to be the case, by the way, that Long and Lady John are "always together". Indeed we, with our first-person point of view, first meet Gilbert Long on the platform of the train that is to take us to this country house ("Newmarch") and to its high-society weekend party. Long is standing alone when we meet him. Lady John is to come along later, apparently by another train.
The theory that it is Lady John that is having enlivening effects on the appearance and character of Long, so that he no longer "looks blank," is not destined to last ... well ... long. The predominant presumption of our narrator's theorizing is that someone is enlivened only when someone else is sapped. And that does not meet this hypothetical couple, since Lady John is always "as pointed as a hat-pin". She isn't being sapped.
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