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Title: The House of Mirth (Oxford World's Classics) by Edith Wharton, Martha Banta ISBN: 0-19-283579-3 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: January, 2000 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $10.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.39 (82 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Almost perfect.
Comment: Prior to reading The House of Mirth, I had read both The Age of Innocence and Ethan Frome. The House of Mirth deals with moneyed New York families, as does The Age of Innocence, but The House of Mirth has a more serious tone and a more tragic storyline, in that the main character is a woman who is a victim of her times. Lily Bart lives in an era when to be poor is the worst punishment of New York society. The idea of having to work for a living is untenable. Her goal in life is to marry well, but she struggles with the idea of abandoning her goals for true happiness just to marry well. The story deals with her misadventures in society, and the sometimes painful price her relatives and friends extract from her in exchange for financial support. This is a very enjoyable, although sad, novel, and I recommend it particularly to those who have already read some Edith Wharton and wish to round out their selection of writing.
Rating: 5
Summary: Brilliant but oh so bleak...
Comment: "The House of Mirth" is a rich, nuanced study of New York upper class at the turn of the century. It is also a portrait of a single, beautiful, no longer so young (29-it is the turn of the century woman) struggling to survive in this society. This book will break your heart.
Lily Bart is nearly penniless, not an unusual condition for the heroine of a novel. However, in her case, she does not exist in the lower classes and is not struggling to make her way to the top. Instead, she has been born at the top and she lives in a world where breeding, beauty and money (preferably of an older vintage) matter the most. Bart possesses the first two attributes and she is using them to gain the third.
Bart's only hope for survival in the world of Old New York society is to make an advantageous marriage and in her case it has to be to someone wealthy. The book details the various compromises she can make--basically, the coarser the person, the higher a price he is willing to pay for her breeding.
Several themes run through this book: money, of course, and the various forms it takes in "society" (e.g., old money, new money, newer money); class (the book has many anti-semitic references to a wealthy individual who is Jewish--and who is willing to pay a high price for Lily initially); integrity (which basically belongs to those of such older families as Lily's); and finally, true love, which comes in the form of Selden, a young, poor but well bred New Yorker, whom Lily loves in spite of herself.
Wharton depicts Lily's downward course in the world. In many ways, Wharton's heroine travels in the opposite direction of characters in books like Dreiser's: a dreiser character might begin in poverty, sacrifice her virtue and integrity, and rise up in the world. In Lily's case, the more she holds on to her integrity, the harder she falls in the world.
I would recommend this book to those who like 19th and early 20th century American and British fiction. IN addition, those individuals who enjoy women's books from all eras should appreciate "The House of Mirth."
Rating: 5
Summary: Don't accept imitations
Comment: This is the original "Sex and the City" and a century and the alleged sexual revolution have not lessened its sting. Any single woman of the present day can recognize some of herself in Lily Bart--the optimism, the refusal to settle, the accumulating horrors of growing old in the sexual marketplace. Even the economic details aren't far off--it's a nasty struggle to make it on your own in New York, and a lot of women seem to count on an "ATM" (see "Bergdorf Blondes") or rich boyfriend to make ends meet. As the years pass, this becomes less of an option, and all of us fear the modern version of the drudgery that Lily endures toward the end. A thought-provoking if somewhat depressing story, full of lavish period detail and Wharton's trademark precise and elegant prose. Read it and weep.
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Title: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, Louis Auchincloss ISBN: 0375753206 Publisher: Modern Library Pub. Date: 02 March, 1999 List Price(USD): $9.95 |
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Title: Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser, Richard Lingeman ISBN: 0451527607 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: 10 April, 2000 List Price(USD): $5.95 |
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Title: CliffsNotes On Wharton's The House of Mirth by Bruce Edward Walker ISBN: 0764537164 Publisher: Hungry Minds Inc- Cliff Notes Pub. Date: 28 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $5.99 |
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Title: Awakening by Kate Chopin ISBN: 0380002450 Publisher: Avon Pub. Date: 10 February, 1982 List Price(USD): $4.50 |
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Title: The Second Sex by Simone De Beauvoir ISBN: 0679724516 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 17 December, 1989 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
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