nineteenth century fiction is about the world, and george eliot wrote about the world in front of themd >> reporter: introduced a kind of crack in the novel because he makes it into capital a art and literature and only certain things are worthy of serious literary attention. and if the ambassadors were the guy, family fortune derived from ordinary everyday years. never told you what the thing is. it is 800 pages long. there is a consensus in henry james's scholarship has to do with toilets. there would be a whole novel about the toilet, how the factory works and industrial relations in the factory and how it got sold and harlequin cornered the toilet market and james won't go there and the odd thing, the english language literature tradition, if the subject is inherently interesting some how you get-literary points. >> it is certainly true. >> it is the case. >> who helped you? where did you come from? you sound like tom wolfe. the essay he wrote in harper's about where the novel went wrong and explaining why the bonfire of the vanities was such a big success. >> i disagree with that