Depending on the study guide provider sparknotes shmoop etc the resources below will generally offer the figure in the carpet chapter summaries quotes and analysis of themes characters and symbols.
The figure in the carpet shmoop.
The figure in the carpet plot summary an un named literary critic feels he has successfully reviewed the latest work of hugh vereker a distinguished novelist.
The figure in the carpet henry james 1843 1916 the story ostensibly concerns a young literary critics who greatly admirs the writer hugh vereker.
In a gesture of compensation one supposes vereker confides to the narrator that his fictions are all linked by a single idea or scheme that no critic has ever noticed but that is the very secret.
But when he meets the author in person at a social event vereker tells him that whilst the review is intelligent he has missed the hidden underlying issue which informs all of his writing.
And yet the story in which the idiom was born henry james s 1896 tale the figure in the carpet refuses to open itself up to easy interpretations or analysis.