sending up her great friend, Henry
James: The Wings of Death sounds
very like The Wings of the Dove;
The Supreme Moment, too, is
Jamesian in its majestic inscrutabil-
ity. Mrs. Roby is the only member
who admits to not having read The
Wings of Death, and even con-
fesses to having immersed rather
than read The Supreme Moment
by dropping it into a raging Brazilian
River by mistake. It is the name of
this river, Xingu, which Mrs. Roby,
mischievously and delicately raises
as mysterious topic of conversation
after Osric's arrival, for the ladies
find themselves at a loss to offer
elevating insight into The Wings of
Death. Only after the rapid depar-
ture of Mrs. Roby and Osric Dane,
together, do the ladies discover
that Xingu is a river in Brazil rather
than a philosophy, religion or other
intellectual entity. Xingu, the story,
will remind contemporary readers
of another lunchtime intellectual,
Charlotte Haze, mother of Lolita, in
Nabokov's novel.
Continue on to read Xingu...
Mrs. Roby is
the pariah
of the group,
who admits
to reading
Trollope
rather than
contemporary
authors...
HYLAND
