isabel archer seeing lord warburton

after the minor climax that briefly emphasizes isabel's will to freedom (i mean the incident of mrs. toughett asking her not to stay up late in the company of people not from her circle of relatives), isabel talks even more with lord warburton, because the lord told her about many things, including his picturesque mansion, that interest isabel. from the talk, isabel can somewhat 'read' and 'theorize' the lord. to her, the lord is rather ideal because he is the kind of rich people who go for equality and other radical ideas and in the real life he doesn't seem to make a merit of his wealth. this makes him rather special in her eyes. however, the lord doesn't seem to know that isabel just messes up with him when she asks about 'artless things and the lord answers very seriously'.

later, from her conversation with her cousin, ralph touchett, she knows that the lord, despite his high position and importance, never 'takes himself seriously'.

here is i can see for the first time that isabel and ralph shares the same interest (or need?) in formulating or structuring things. an small overinterpretation might lead me to say that this shows the real trait of modern people in cartesian sense. it's not a sin for james to do this. it is indeed the trait of modern people who always try to understand, and later to control, everything that shows up before their eyes. james himself has shown another character of his that has the same characteristic, that is, winterbourne of daisy miller and dr. sloper in washington square. however, if we see deeper, we might find the same tendency in other literary works produced by 'englightened' authors who adhere to philosophical thoughts from descartes to those before nietzsche.

anyway, let us now continue to the scene when isabel tries to ask her uncle about lord warburton. her uncle, mr. touchett, has a different opinion about the lord. to him, the lord is the kind of person--usually from the upper class--who talk about changes in any occasion without every trying hard enough to realize those ideas. mr. touchett even emphasizes that those upper class people only take their ideas from theories--by theories i assume he means philosophical thoughts that have been adhered by intellectuals--and they use them as amusement only. in other words, he consider them to be grasping the theories as 'mere' knowledge, not as something that they really believe wholeheartedly and then realize them with all their might. he uses their luxurious way of life as an example that can prove this. however, after isabel protests that the lord is a nice person and might not be a humbug, her uncle tells her that the lord is an amiable person and he will even be safe during a revolution, because everybody seems to like him. here the uncle makes his point: no matter what, the lord is not a real radical.

in this chapter, we can see another character of isabel revealed, that she is liberal as well as conservative. and she says that she is 'a little bit of everything'. it is true that we cannot wholly believe in what isabel says, since several times she doesn't say what she really feels (we will find it later in the chapter when ralph interrogates her about her rejection of warburton's decision, but in this chapter 8, we can say that what isabel says does reflect her true self. i would say that this is another significant small stroke on the canvas that will result in the complete portrait of this lady.