In the novella, "The Beast in The Jungle," by Henry James, James takes his readers into the mind of the protagonist, John Marcher. Marcher meets a woman by the name of May Bartram who will unknowingly bring him to a moment of sudden revelation about his life. It is in this way that James tries to convey his central message: A life that is lived with the preoccupation with oneself and affairs, along with the fear of failure and/or judgment, is a life that is wasted. James begins the novella already in the mind of John Marcher while he is at a gathering with friends. James writes, “John Marcher found himself, among such suggestions, disconcerted almost equally by the presence of those who knew too much and by those who knew nothing.” (478). Here James begins to depict John as a person who is more too himself, and who is uncomfortable around the people who know too much about him, perhaps because he fears that they may judge him based off what they know about him, and around the people who don’t know much about him, perhaps because they may want become well acquainted with him. It is when Marcher meets May Bartram that the readers begins to see the self centered side of him. When explaining their encounter ten years prior, Marcher gets almost every detail wrong. James writes, “Marcher flattered himself the illumination was brilliant, yet he was more pleased on her showing him the amusement, that in his haste to make everything right he had got most things rather wrong.” (479). The reader notices the contrast in character between Marcher and Bartram in this simple confrontation. The fact that the two of them met and went through the same experiences, but only Bartram remembers everything while Marcher remembers almost nothing, shows how self centered Marcher truly is. The reader can see this more when Bartram mentions that Marcher had told her something all those years ago. Marcher did not remember what he had told her, but his