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The Age of Innocence (Collector's Library)

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It was a glittering, sumptuous time when hypocrisy was expected, discreet infidelity tolerated, and unconventionality ostracized.

That is the Gilded Age, and nobody knew its hypocrises better than Edith Wharton.... and nobody portrayed them as well. "The Age of Innocence" is a trip back in time to the stuffy upper crust of "old New York," taking us through one respectable man's hopeless love affair with a beautiful woman -- and the life he isn't brave enough to have.

Newland Archer, of a wealthy old New York family, has become engaged to pretty, naive May Welland. But as he tries to get their wedding date moved up, he becomes acquainted with May's exotic cousin, Countess Ellen Olenska, who has returned home after dumping her cheating husband. At first, the two are just friends, but Newland becomes more and more entranced by the Countess' easy, free-spirited European charm.

After Newland marries May, the attraction to the mysterious Countess and her free, unconventional life becomes even stronger. He starts to rebel in little ways, but he's still mired in a 100% conventional marriage, job and life. Will he become an outcast and go away with the beautiful countess, or will he stick with May and the safe, dull life that he has condemned in others?

There's nothing too scandalous about "Age of Innocence" in a time when starlets acquire and discard boyfriends and husbands like old pantyhose -- it probably wasn't in the 1920s when it was first published. But then, this isn't a book about sexiness and steam -- it's part bittersweet romance, part social satire, and a look at what happens when human beings lose all spontaneity and passion.

Part of this is due to Wharton's portrayal of New York in the 1870s -- opulent, cultured, pleasant, yet so tied up in tradition that few people in it are able to really open up and live. It's a haze of ballrooms, gardens, engagements, and careful social rituals that absolutely MUST be followed, even if they have no meaning. It's a place "where the real thing was never said or done or even thought."

And Wharton writes distant, slightly mocking prose that outlines this sheltered little society. Her writing opens as slowly and beautifully as a rosebud, letting subtle subplots and powerful, hidden emotions drive the story. So don't be discouraged by the endless conversations about flowers, ballrooms, gloves and old family scandals that don't really matter anymore.

In the middle of all this, Newland is a rather dull, intelligent young man who thinks he's unconventional. But he becomes more interesting as he struggles between his conscience and his longing for the Countess. And as "Age of Innocence" winds on, you gradually see that he doesn't truly love the Countess, but what she represents -- freedom from society and convention.

The other two angles of this love triangle are May and Ellen. May is (suitably) pallid and rather dull, though she shows some different sides in the last few chapters. And Ellen is a magnificent character -- alluring, mysterious, but also bewildered by New York's hostility to her ways. And she's even more interesting when you realize that she isn't trying to rebel, but simply being herself.

"Age of Innocence" is a subtle look at life in Gilded Age New York, telling the story of a man desperately in love with a way of life he hasn't got the courage to pursue. Exquisite in its details, painful in its beauty.

Newland Archer, the protagonist of this ironically entitled novel set in the late nineteenth century, is a proper New York gentleman, and part of a society which adheres to strict social codes, subordinating all aspects of life to doing what is expected, which is synonymous with doing what it right. As the author remarks early in the novel, "Few things were more awful than an offense against Taste." Newland meets and marries May Welland, an unimaginative, shallow young woman whose upbringing has made her the perfect, inoffensive wife, one who knows how to behave and how to adhere to the "rules" of the society in which they live.

When Newland is reintroduced to May's cousin, Countess Ellen Olenska, who has left her husband in Europe and now wants a divorce, he finds himself utterly captivated by her independence and her willingness to risk all, socially, by flouting convention. Both Ellen and Newland are products of their upbringing and their culture, however, and they resist their feelings because of their separate social obligations. Various meetings between them suggest that their feelings are far stronger than what is obvious on the surface, and the question of whether they will finally state the obvious or act on their feelings constitutes the plot.

Wharton creates an exceptionally realistic picture of New York in the post-Civil War era, a time in which aristocrats of inherited wealth found themselves competing socially with parvenus. Her ability to show the conflict between a person's need for social acceptance and the desire for personal freedom is striking. As the various characters make their peace with their decisions--either to challenge or yield to social dictates--the novel achieves an unusual dramatic tension, subtle because of its lack of direct confrontation and powerful in its effects on individual destinies. This is, in fact, less an "age of innocence" than it is an age of social manipulation.

Wharton herself manipulates the reader--some of her best dialogues and scenes are those the characters never actually have--conversations that they imagine, confrontations which they never allow themselves to have, and resolutions which happen through inaction rather than through decision-making. Filled with acute social observations, the novel shows individuals convincing themselves that obeying social dictates is the right thing to do. Though the novel sometimes seems claustrophobic due to its limitations on action, Age of Innocence brilliantly captures the age and attitudes of the era. Mary Whipple

Newland Archer, the protagonist of this ironically entitled novel set in the late nineteenth century, is a proper New York gentleman, and part of a society which adheres to strict social codes, subordinating all aspects of life to doing what is expected, which is synonymous with doing what it right. As the author remarks early in the novel, "Few things were more awful than an offense against Taste." Newland meets and marries May Welland, an unimaginative, shallow young woman whose upbringing has made her the perfect, inoffensive wife, one who knows how to behave and how to adhere to the "rules" of the society in which they live.

When Newland is reintroduced to May's cousin, Countess Ellen Olenska, who has left her husband in Europe and now wants a divorce, he finds himself utterly captivated by her freedom and her willingness to risk all, socially, by flouting convention. Both Ellen and Newland, however, are products of their upbringing and their culture, and they dutifully resist their feelings because of their separate social obligations. Various meetings between them suggest that their feelings are far stronger than what is obvious on the surface, and the question of whether either of them will finally state their feelings pervades the novel.

Wharton creates an exceptionally realistic picture of New York in the post-Civil War era, a time in which aristocrats of inherited wealth found themselves competing socially with parvenus, and social rules were changing. Her ability to show the conflict between a person's desire for freedom and his/her need for social acceptance is striking. As the various characters make their peace with their decisions--either to conform to or to challenge social dictates--the novel achieves an unusual dramatic tension, subtle because of its lack of direct confrontation and powerful in its effects on individual destinies. This is, in fact, less an "age of innocence" than it is an age of social manipulation.

Wharton herself manipulates the reader--her best dialogues are those in which the characters never actually participate--conversations that they keep to themselves, confrontations which they never allow themselves to have, and resolutions which happen through inaction rather than through decision-making. Filled with acute social observations, the novel shows individuals convincing themselves that obeying social dictates is the right thing to do. Though the novel sometimes seems to smother the reader with its limitations on action, Age of Innocence brilliantly captures the age and attitudes of the era. Mary Whipple

This is a stunning masterpiece of American literature. Wharton reaches the heights achieved by England's George Eliot in Middlemarch. Age of Innnocence is considered one of the top 100 novels in the English language and I heartily agree. The novel is set in the Golden Age of New York high society in the 1870's. Like Middlemarch, manners and rigid conformity assure success. Love is an anomaly.

Newland Archer, rich and well-connected, is poised to marry May Welland. She is beautiful, suitable and pure. In fact she is compared to a Diana, goddess of the hunt. This is the virgin archetype, untouchable, pure and only desirable from a distance. Archer meets her scandalous cousin, the Countess Olenska. Olenska has committed the unforgivable and left her husband for another man. She is taboo. She is also older, wiser and sexual (more taboos.) Archer is irrestibly drawn to her and thus forms the conflict for the rest of the novel.

No one of her era writes of toxic marriages better than Wharton; she had her own tragic marriage to a man who used her fortune to set up a house for his mistress. And don't forget Wharton's equally famous novel Ethan Frome, about another toxic marriage that ends in grief.

Good news,by the way; Wharton's home in Lennox, MA, the Mount, is being restored. It's home to a resident theater that does some brilliant Shakespeare. If you have a chance to go, do so. It's a wonderful experience.

I am a college student with a plethora of essays to write, tests to study for, and books to read (most of which I honestly don't have time to finish); but many a task were set aside and the fluorescent light in my dorm room burned late into the night as I was drawn into Edith Wharton's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Age of Innocence. I was enticed by every one of Wharton's characters and the settings they so splendidly occupy. In the first scene, we are not only introduced to the central characters of the novel, but also to Wharton's keen insight on New York high society in the 1870's; they are a people who "dreaded scandal more than disease," and "want to get away from amusement ever more quickly than they want to get to it." We meet and are immediately attracted to the young and intelligent Newland Archer, who is admiring from afar his fiancé-to-be at the New York Opera. Both Archer and his love, May Welland, are of the highest class and make the most fitting couple (as is to be expected). But as Archer is studying May's purity and imagining their wedded bliss, he notices the entrance of a scandalously clad young woman into May's opera box. [Insert dramatic music] The appearance of Countess Olenska (May's cousin) triggers gasps and rumors from the observant, and introduces the central and ensuing conflicts of the novel: non-conformity versus docile submission, passionate love versus restraint and responsibility. In The Age of Innocence, Wharton presents a dichotomy of characters that we are compelled to identify with. She submits a moral dilemma that she purposefully neglects to resolve. My passionate, impulsive side yearned for Archer to forget any and all promises he had made, to forget the shame that he would bring upon his and May's family, and just escape with Countess Olenska from the stiff New York society forced upon him. But my reasonable, more stable side knew that this would only have tragic results for all involved. But should he endure a life of tedium just to keep up appearances? Was it in fact a life if tedium, or did it prove fruitful in the end? These are all quandaries left for Wharton's audience to sort through and decide for themselves. I love The Age of Innocence; Wharton paints a lucid portrait of a society I was unfamiliar with but now feel inexplicably linked to; of a people who were consciously blinded by a rigid stratum of etiquette and propriety. I am grateful to live in a much more liberated time, where my every word and action isn't scrutinized by an entire city. But I couldn't help but be enthralled and enchanted by the gas lit streets, the majestic ballrooms, and the other charming aspects of old New York. The Age of Innocence is one of the best social commentaries I have ever read, and I recommend it to all.

Nobody knew the hypocrises of "old New York" better than Edith Wharton, and nobody portrayed them as well. In "The Age of Innocence," Wharton took readers on a trip through the stuffy upper crust of 1870s New York, wrapped up in a hopeless love affair.

Newland Archer, of a wealthy old New York family, has become engaged to pretty, naive May. But as he tries to get their wedding date moved up, he becomes acquainted with May's exotic cousin, Countess Olenska, who has returned home after dumping her cheating count husband. At first, the two are friends, but then they become something more.

After Newland marries May, the attraction to the mysterious Countess and her free, unconventional life becomes even stronger. He starts to rebel in little ways, but he's still mired in a 100% conventional marriage, job and life. Will he become an outcast and go away with the beautiful countess, or will he stick with May and a safe, dull life?

There's nothing too scandalous about "Age of Innocence" in a time when J.Lo acquires and discards boyfriends and husbands like old pantyhose. Probably it wasn't in the 1920s, when the book was first published. But this isn't a book to read if you appreciate sexiness and steam -- instead it's a social satire, a bittersweet romance, and a look at what happens when human beings lose all spontaneity and passion.

Wharton brings old New York to life in this book -- opulent, beautiful, cultured, yet empty and kind of boring. It is "where the real thing was never said or done or even thought," so tied up in tradition that nobody there really lives. And even though the unattainable countess is beautiful and sweet, it becomes obvious after awhile that Newland is actually in love with the idea of breaking out of his conventional life.

Wharton's writing is a bit like a giant rosebud -- it takes forever to fully open. So don't be discouraged by the endless conversations about flowers, ballrooms and gloves. Wharton put them in to illustrate her point about New York at that time, and all the stories about different families, scandals and customs are actually very important.

Newland seems like a rather boring person, since he only has brief bursts of individuality. But he gets more interesting when he struggles between his conscience and his longing for freedom. May is (suitably) pallid and a bit dull, while the Countess is alluringly mysterious and unconsciously rebellious. The fact that she doesn't TRY to rebel makes her far more interesting than Newland.

"Age of Innocence" considered a story about a man in love with an unattainable woman, but it's also about that man straining against a stagnant, hypocritical society. Rich, intriguing and beautifully written.

It's the happiest day of your life; you're about to make known to all of society your newly planned wedding engagement. Things are going great for you, that is until your fiancés cousin returns to town, and you fall head over heels in love with her. Then what do you do? You're torn between the perfection of your innocent little fiancé and the mysteriousness of the cousin that everyone talks about. The choices are simple; stick to your fiancé and be completely accepted by society, or run away with her cousin and never have to wonder about the happiness that you may have missed out on. Maybe this isn't the easiest decision to make. Newland Archer, a wealthy businessman in New York during the late 1870's, was a typical example of a males role in society during this time period. As all of the upper class individuals around him, Newland attended operas, went to balls, and was engaged to a girl whom everyone knew and respected. May Welland, the girl he was to marry, was the epitome of the perfect girl, young, beautiful, pure, innocent, and sweet. He loved May deeply, but with the return of her cousin Ellen from Europe, Newland's attention was taken from May and focused more intensely on Ellen's mysterious background and the talk that was spreading through society about her. Newland saw Ellen as no one else in New York did. To everyone else other than he, she was only a topic for conversation. Her past was filled with scandals and secrets, ones which seemed of great importance to everyone except Newland. Newland fell in love with Ellen as quickly as she had appeared in New York. He loved how different and open she was, she wasn't so concerned with the thoughts and opinions of others that she forgot what life was all about. However, there were many things that kept Newland and Ellen away from one another throughout the novel, the main issue being the society around them. The idea of Ellen divorcing her first husband is looked down upon by the New York society, as well as the idea of a well-known man such as Newland having anything to do with such a woman. Newland's love for Ellen is distracted by the whispering from the society all around him, and the disapproval of the society towards his actions. This theme of society's interactions with the lives of individuals appears continuously throughout the novel, and appears to be the main theme that Wharton is trying to get across to her readers. She does an exceptional job of portraying the impact of other peoples thoughts on the actions and thoughts of her main characters. The language used throughout the novel is also quite intriguing. Wharton uses excellent diction and word choice to describe the appearances of her characters, as well as the scenery around them. When describing the thoughts and emotions of each of her character's, her descriptions and details bring the reader into the story with them. She lets her readers see into the minds and thoughts of each character; she shows what they're thinking at any given moment and how their thoughts differ from their public emotions. She does a brief overview of the backgrounds of each character, which, at the beginning of the novel becomes quite overwhelming, but doesn't last too long once you get into the book. After you start seeing a character's name appear more than once or twice you begin to relate each character back to the family that they're from and the role that they play in society. Once you've got all of the characters memorized and begin to understand the plot, it becomes quite intriguing. The theme of society's affect on individual lives has the capability of changing peoples perceptions of their society. This book shows how the involvement of society and its beliefs on certain subjects, such as divorce, roles of women in society, and other moral issues, can affect the choices an individual makes concerning their life and their happiness. Sometimes people don't always make decisions based on their own happiness; they only do what those around them believe is the right choice. There are several areas in this novel where things seem to drag on and on, but if readers will only take the time to push through these not so exciting pieces, the excitement that occurs later on will definitely make up for their lack of excitement. For example, there are several times when characters are just brought into the novel and seem to be of no importance to the novel whatsoever. These characters however, are the ones who add to the overall picture of who the society is made up of, and the things that are of importance to them. This novel shows how operas, balls, and morality were what New York's society consisted of. If someone disagreed with the society's actions, their thoughts were kept inside, no one spoke their true thoughts in the open. This novel was so filled with passion and desire that it touched the soul as well as the heart of its readers. Wharton reaches into the depths of her character's emotions and pulls them out for her readers to see, feel, and understand. Her readers feel the pain that Newland is going through, as they see him being torn between the two cousins. The pain and emotions that each of the women are struggling through is seen as well, but in May's case it isn't quite as obvious. This novel leaves its readers with a feeling of completion and the belief that there are people out there who will do the right thing, even if it hurts.

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton. Highly recommended.

A classic novel made famous by a recent movie, The Age of Innocence is the story of a society man, Newland Archer, caught between two very different women. On the one hand is May Welland, the virginal Diana of New York society, whose seeming frankness and innocence discourage and oppress him: "Untrained human nature was not frank and innocent; it was full of the twists and defences of an instinctive guile." All this is "supposed to be what he wanted, what he had a right to, in order that he might exercise his lordly pleasure in smashing it like an image made of snow." Her counterpart is her cousin Countess Ellen Olenska, vaguely exotic, vaguely dangerous, forbidden-primarily because she is not the "artificial product" of society, but a genuine, sensual woman whose independent way of thinking is enough to tacitly and then overtly banish her from the very company that Newland's life is built around. She is !"different," as Archer will later discuss with one of his children. No one else would say, "Why not make one's own fashions?" thus giving a voice to what Archer himself deep down believes but can't put into practice.

Ironically, it is May who first forces him and Ellen together, against his will, in her efforts to be kind to her cousin, who has just returned from Europe. As he sees more of "poor Ellen," estranged from her emotionally abusive husband and seemingly vulnerable to the wiles of the wealthy outsider scoundrel Julius Beaufort, he finds himself returning again and again to her until he realises he is in love with her-long after the reader has reached that conclusion. He resolves the dilemma by rushing his marriage to May, which makes it that much worse. Thus ensues a delicate balance between the life he has chosen with May, with whom he now realises he has no emotional bond, and the life he would choose if he were more sure of himself, more sure that being true to !oneself is more important than being true to one's system.

Nearly every character is memorable-from the massive Mrs. Manson Mingott, May and Ellen's grandmother who is old enough and skilled enough to intuit all and manipulate all; to the womanizing Lawrence Lefferts, whose behavior is acceptable because he knows how to play the game, how things are "done"; to the frigid bastions of society, the van der Luydens; to May's mother, who cannot be exposed in any way to "unpleasantness"; to Archer's virginal sister Janey, who lives life vicariously through gossip and guesswork.

Many scenes and locations are equally vivid: Beaufort's lavish house and party; the contrast of the van der Luydens' dinner party; Archer and May's conventional and stifling honeymoon, more sporty than romantic or passionate; Archer's pursuit of May in Florida and his following Ellen to the Blenkers' and then to Boston; a revealing ride with Ellen in May's brougham; Mrs. Mingott's house in the m!iddle of "nowhere," where she rules like a queen and where the politics are only slightly less complicated than those of Elizabeth I's court-all unforgettable places and scenes.

In less intelligent or skilled hands, the plot could have become mere melodrama, but Wharton knows how her society worked, who inhabited it, what it forgave, and what it could not pardon. Affairs are pardonable; treachery, real or perceived, to the framework of what holds these people together is not. In the end, May saves Archer from himself-and dooms him to her kind of life by doing so. When he gives up all his dreams, he looks into May's "blue eyes, wet with tears." She knows what he does not and remains cold as the moon that the goddess Diana rules.

It could be said that May and Ellen represent two sides of Newland Archer-both are people he is afraid to become. If he is like May, he experiences death of the mind, death of the soul, death of the emotions, becoming what he is expected t!o be to keep the foundations that society is built upon steady, strong, and standing. (It is no coincidence that a theme in Wharton's The House of Mirth is the vulnerability of that house to the influx of modern ways.) If he becomes like Ellen, he will lose everything that he has built his own foundations on. In the end, he is neither, nor is he himself. His tragedy is not that much less than that of The House of Mirth's Lily Bart, both victims of a society they need but cannot survive.

Diane L. Schirf, 28 April 2001.

When Edith Wharton published THE AGE OF INNOCENCE in 1920, she was writing of an age from her youth, one that had strict rules of conduct, one that punished those who flouted those rules, and one that rewarded those who broke them but had the good sense to do so quietly. The New York of the 1870s was just such an age. The upper echelons were peopled by the first and second generation newly rich. Those who counted knew everyone else who counted too. Such people lived lives that were unconnected to their more poverty-stricken brethren who lived away from the tree-lined terraces on Park Avenue. The married men were expected to have their sleazy affairs. The married women were expected to tolerate them. Single women were expected to get ready to become married women, knowing all the while the rules of the game.

Into just such a society, lawyer Newland Archer lives and works. He is one of the "innocents" of the title. He is ready to marry but in his innocence he plans to remain faithful. His world is ordered and logical. Enter his fiancé, May Welland. She too is innocent but her innocence is not the same as Newland's. Where he believes in the magic of the rabbit being pulled from the hat, May sees very well the hat's false bottom. May has been brought up to be a more rigidly stratified Stepford Wife, one who marries a man she knows will cheat on her, but her consolation is that, according to the Rules of the Game, his cheating must be covert and cannot lead to divorce. As long as both spouses play by the rules, everyone is reasonably happy and the System functions. Enter, Countess Ellen Olenska, a married cousin of May who visits her, meets Newland, and sparks fly. It would be perfectly acceptable for Ellen to tacitly cast a blind eye should Newland and Ellen commence a discrete affair, but for that to happen, the unspoken consensus must be that the affair cannot lead beyond the physical level. For if it were to go beyond that, then the Rules are threatened and the entire flimsy house of cards come crashing down. Ellen and Newland are tempted to have their affair, but they do not because they know that once they do, feelings take over and neither is strong enough to carry on with their hearts tugging one way but their bodies another. What Newland does do is to place his love for Ellen in an internal shrine and there it stays, year after year, neither growing nor shrinking. Eventually, after May has died and Newland is freed from the Rules, he can pick up the pieces even many years later. He and his adult son travel to Paris to see Ellen, but when the son walks into her apartment, Newland does not. Newland has lived with the shrine of love for so long in his heart that he prefers the image of a youthful Ellen to the reality of an aged one.

THE AGE OF INNOCENCE is a novel marked by the clashing of many tragedies, all of which had been erected to allow a rich society to function with minimal friction, but in the crushing of hope for May, Ellen, and Newland, this friction has morphed into a disintegration of all that good people hold dear. For these self-deluding scions of society, the cost is clearly far too high.

The Age of Innocence is an exercise in ironic nostalgia. While ridiculing the hypocrisy, strictures, and sense of entitlement of turn-of-the-century New York aristocracy, Edith Wharton ends her novel with a modern world that is free of such twisted morality, but also devoid of passion, noble restraint, and appreciation of the human experience.

Couched in the first unappealing context is a tale of awkward love, with rough edges and misunderstood silences. Newland Archer, although married to May Welland, is drawn to her cousin Ellen Olenska. Ellen has a casual relationship with the petty proprieties of aristocratic New York, and his disillusionment with his marriage and society is matched by hers. Although rebels in spirit, Newland and Ellen are ultimately guided by a simple morality based on the very real consequences of human interactions.

The Age of Innocence provokes discussion by raising questions but rarely suggesting any answers. After savaging the strictures of old New York, Wharton leaves us with a gem of an observation that love, in fact, may be diluted by the modern freedoms we now enjoy:

"`The difference is that these young people take it for granted that they're going to get whatever they want, and that we almost always took it for granted that we shouldn't. Only, I wonder - the thing one's so certain of in advance: can it ever make one's heart beat as wildly?'"

Similarly, she not only questions those who pretend to be virtuous, but also the very virtues themselves.

"Archer felt irrationally angry. His host's contemptuous tribute to May's `niceness' was just what a husband should have wished to hear said of his wife. The fact that a coarse-minded man found her lacking in attraction was simply another proof of her quality; yet the words sent a faint shiver through his heart. What is `niceness' carried to that supreme degree were only a negation, the curtain dropped before an emptiness?"

May is virtuous by contemporary standards: she is modest, humble, soft-spoken, and kind. Yet these virtues form but a veil to hide the vacuity of her character. Intelligent enough to see through the hypocritical morality of her time, she has neither the desire to do so, nor the will to do anything but adhere to it herself. Yet the partially gender-segregated structure of society, combined with her evident virtues, make her an ideal spouse.

Definitions of virtue may have changed for us in our time, but the struggle between virtue and vacuity is a constant. Perhaps we should take a page out of Wharton's playbook: let us incessantly question that which we hold dear, lest it slip away.