The Ambassadors Character Analysis

By surrounding himself with images of beauty associated with Old World glamour, Chad is able to manipulate his own social status. Strether begins to believe Chad’s appearance has changes since he left for Europe and describes him favorably as “strong and sleek and gay, easy and fragrant and fathomless, with happy health in his colour, and pleasant and silver in his thick young hair” (James 223). Although it is noted that the only thing that is physically different about Chad is the streak of gray in his hair, Strether and Maria remark on an element of refinement regarding his appearance. Through staging and placemen, Chad manages to trick Strether in associating the finery of the objects and culture and class he has surrounded himself
with to his own physical appearance and moral values. However the end of the text reveals that Chad has merely been acting refined and is still the same womanizer he was in America. Business and not culture is to thank for Chad’s change in behavior. Chad’s manipulation of his own personal appearance is comparable to the impact of much like images in an advertisement becoming associated with a product and thus selling as experience. Chad’s staging is impeccable and stresses the importance of appearances in manipulating reality. He beautifies his surface and thus hides the vulgarity of both his affair with a married women and his intentions to return home and go into advertising. Appearances in The Ambassadors are deceiving and the lines between good and bad are unclear. The foreign setting of Paris estranges and enchants Strether and makes him susceptible to manipulation by Chad. This motif of ambiguity and uncertainty guides the plot and confuses the original black and white mission for which Strether has been sent to Europe. At the beginning of the text it is believes that Chad is good but has fallen victim to wicked women whom Strether must rescue him from. It sets up the themes common in expatriate fiction of the good, innocent American and the immoral European. However the end of the book questions this cliché as Chad is revealed to have been the immoral force manipulating the European rather than being an innocent victim. America versus Europe is played out through what initially appears to be a battle over Chad between Madame de Vionnet in Europe and Mrs. Newsome in America. In their fight the two are contrasted. Madame de Vionnet is a symbol of culture and the leisure class. Meanwhile Mrs. Newsome is a hardworking American businesswoman. Her occupation is steeped in vulgarity as not only does she work for a living, but also the product she produces is so embarrassingly vulgar and trivial that Strether refuses to reveal what it is. Strether originally associated Chad with the cultural capital of Madame de Vionnet and believed he was resisting his mother’s control, however the shock at the end of the text comes when Strether realizes that Chad’s values and concurrent of his mother’s. Once Chad acquires a basic understanding of cultural capital and practiced his performance of culture on his family’s trusted ambassador, he declares that he is ready to return home. He lacks sympathy for Maria and discards her after gaining an understanding of culture and leisure from her. His relationship with her seems to have been all about acquirement and once he sucks all the reusable value out of her and Europe, he is ready to go home and show off his Europeanized graces in American business. Chad “suddenly” turns to the subject of advertising, further linking his performance in Europe to a rehearsal of advertisement. Chad declares that advertisement is “an art like another, and infinite like all the arts” (James 431). Chad attempts to remove the vulgarity behind advertisement and make it an art by riddling it with the fine arts associated with leisure in Europe. However there is hollowness in Chad’s art, and his explanation to Strether regarding his deception is “delivered up in the form on an endless promotion of surface appearances, powered by ominous depths of calculation” (Greenslade 100-101). In manipulating appearances, Chad promotes Europe to Strether, mirroring the promotion of a product or good. James does not attempt to hide the vulgarity in Chad’s “art” despite his use of culture and reveals the brutality underlying advertisement through Chad’s devotion to money and his career over companionship and love. Chad’s use of Maria for his own selfish gain links him to American business. If Chad can sell the debauchery of Europe to a Puritanical American like Strether, surely he can sell the vulgar product produced by the Newsome’s. As the two characters guiding the action in The Ambassadors, a strong parallel is made between Chad and Mrs.
Newsome. However while their values are the same, their methods differ and reveal an emerging model of business. In attempting to get their way, both use ambassadors to perform for them. While Strether is initially the only named ambassador, Chad has a string of ambassadors whom he enlists to sway his mother’s ambassador and impact her at home (Higgins 165). In using Strether as a vehicle to reach his business-focused mother, Chad seems to demonstrate his capability of persuasion and manipulation. Using others further falsifies appearances and helps Chad convey the impression of self-refinement. The motif of ambassadors is “linked with the motif of dramatic acting and performance – the means of creating an illusion of reality” which is the epitome of Chad’s performance (Higgins 166). Bilham and Miss Barrace are the most notable of Chad’s ambassadors as they engage directly with Strether. Bilham continually assures Strether that Chad’s romantic attachment in Europe is virtuous, when this is untrue. Strether’s belief in the virtue behind the affair with this mysterious woman becomes the focal point upon which he allows himself to be won over by Chad and the experience. Strether’s admiration of Madame de Vionnet changes his function in the text and he switches roles, becoming an ambassador for Chad. He praises Chad heavily to the his audience of Sarah Pocock and Waymarsh explaining, “well, the performance could only go on.” (James 279). Strether calling his change in alliances a “performance” reveals the staged mannerisms of the entire affair. Strether’s role reversal draws into question the future of American business as he abandons the hardworking businesswomen and is won over by Chad’s flamboyant display. Similar to his mother, Chad enlists and manages those around him like a company. However the ethics behind his showy display of advertisement
conflict with the classical American business model and suggest a future built upon appearances and lacking in moral substance. As the young nation of America sculpted its identity at the start of the 20th century, there was an engagement with and corruption of Europe standards. Industrialization in the 19th century brought on an era of consumerism in the 20th, which led to an increase in advertising. In The Ambassadors and Custom of the Country Chad and Undine use Europe and the cultural capital that the young American continent lacks to further them and mask the vulgarity behind their motivations. By borrowing European ideals of cultural capital and conspicuous consumption, the vulgarity behind advertisement can be hidden. With the masking of appearances and reality hidden in these texts, Wharton and James suggest a bleak future for American business with death of refinement and respectability in favor of money and deception.