Customer Reviews

Summer

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Edith Wharton did the impossible with "Summer" and wrote a love story I actually cared about. Not because her protagonists are likeable, but because their character flaws render them believable and intriguing and fill the reader with sensational expectations; they are not just mannequins waiting to be posed within the frame of a formulaic plot. A novel published in 1917 that depicts an abortionist withholding a piece of jewelry from a woman until she pays her fee is obviously not something that was shaped by the cookie cutter.

Wharton sets the story in an isolated village called North Dormer, evidently in the Berkshires of western Massachussetts. The heroine, a young woman named Charity Royall, is bored with her life there as the sole librarian of the village's shoddy, neglected library when one day she meets Lucius Harney, an urbane young architect who has come to North Dormer to visit a relative and to sketch colonial houses. Their initial friendship blossoms into a romance which is threatened by two factors: Charity's guardian, the local lawyer Mr. Royall, a stingy, miserable man who drinks too much, desires to marry her; and Charity, an orphan raised by Mr. Royall and his deceased wife, is embarrassed by her heritage as a child born among the shunned, destitute farmers who live up on the "Mountain," as it is called.

Wharton, the model of what good American prose looked like in the early twentieth century, is more importantly a thematic innovator who seeks to reflect female identity, in this case personified by a rustic girl who attempts to break the constraints of her native element by pursuing an improbable romance with a man whose sophistication allows him to take advantage of her simplicity, only to turn to another man whose position allows him to take advantage of the situation in which the first man placed her. One detects an echo of Wharton's own unhappy marriage in the story, and indeed the decision Charity makes at the end seems to spring from desperate resignation, the defeated sense of being trapped, rather than from true love. For Wharton, the way out was through the power and elegance of the written word, but Charity, oblivious to the wonder of the books she has so long tended but ignored, has no such option.

Written when Wharton's own marriage was failing, this tale of first love won and lost is a bittersweet, moving novel which melds Wharton's two worlds beautifully - high society, and rural New England. Her personal favorite of all the novels she wrote, Edith Wharton captures the very essence of love and longing in this beautiful, sensual story of Charity Royall and Lucius Harney. Born to a poor mother, Mr. Royall rescues Charity and raises her as his own daughter, but when his wife dies of consumption, and Charity begins to ripen into a lovely woman, Mr. Royal realizes that his feelings for her are deeper than he imagined. Repulsed by his offer of marriage, Charity instead turns her attentions to the handsome young architect from Boston, Mr. Lucius Harney, who is visiting North Dormer for the summer. As summer unfurls in North Dormer like the Red Rambler rose in Charity's garden, Charity and Lucius' love blossoms, burns hot, and spills over into sexual union. Wharton's language of love is extraordinary - beautiful, sensual, and filled with all the fire of first love. I won't ruin the ending for you by revealing it, but it is poignant, achingly human, and ultimately fitting that Charity ends up where she does. Bittersweet and gorgeously written, this is a magical book not to be missed.

[Note: do not read the spoiler review by "George & Georgia Eliot" on this site before you read the book (I'm glad I didn't) since the reviewer reveals the plot line even in the title of the review. Hey, thanks a lot. Don't you know you're supposed to put "spoiler alert" on things like that?] As for SUMMER itself, it was a delightful surprise from Wharton. One of the few books in which she actually admits that her characters have sex (oh, my) and actually does it tastefully and in strict accordance with the characters' natures and the plot itself. The ending was a stunning surprise, and this from a huge Wharton fan, who found this book accidentally for the Kindle. Thank you, those who made this book available for free, but I would've paid to read this one. SUMMER is one of the best books Wharton ever wrote. Thumbs up on character development, irony, plot, dialogue, etc. Great read. 5*

Written in 1917, Summer is Wharton's most explicitly sexual novel, tracing the awakening of Charity Royall to the sweetness of love and its power. Charity was born on "the mountain," a place of poverty and degradation, and given over to Lawyer Royall and his wife, residents of the town of North Dormer, to be brought up. When his wife dies, Lawyer Royall is hard pressed to deal with this child, choosing to ignore her most of the time, and bringing her up with little feeling of warmth of affection.

Anxious to have some independence so that she can escape, at some point, from the closed society of the village, Charity becomes the town librarian, a part-time job which gives her a small amount of her own money. There she encounters Lucius Harney, the nephew of one of the town's leading citizens, an architect studying some of the old houses in the area. His interest in Charity soon develops into affection and then passion, and the two become lovers, a relationship which quickly develops complications. Charity, with few options in life, is starved for affection and yearns to escape the village, while Harney, educated but personally weak, can already come and go as he pleases.

Wharton uses the seasons symbolically to illustrate the development of the relationship between Charity Royall and Lucius Harney from the earliest stirrings of their interest when they meet in early June to the full passion of their love in mid-August. Fall brings reality to Charity, and winter freezes her soul. Throughout the novel references are made to the mountain where Charity was born and to the ignorant people who live there without hope of improving their lives. Charity's own return to visit her family shows her the desperation of their lives, and her need to grasp whatever escape route is available to her.

Wharton's bold depiction of sexual themes makes this novel unusual for its period. She depicts a young woman who has a fierce desire for independence but who has few opportunities to escape her environment, a young woman who latches onto a relationship which broadens her world. She minces no words in showing scenes in which sexual abuse rears its ugly head, and she is realistic in the options she gives for "fallen" women like Charity to deal with the complications of their lives in the "fall" of the relationship. Though the beginning of the novel may seem sentimental or melodramatic, Wharton has a clear vision of the limited possibilities open to young women of the day, and her conclusion emphasizes this. n Mary Whipple

Summer and Ethan Frome are often referred to as companion novels. The only thing these two novels have in common is location and doomed romance. While doomed romance seems to be a major theme in much of Wharton's work, this book pushes the envelope by dealing not only with sex (The House of Mirth also implies some sexuality), but also abortion. I found this novel more engaging than Ethan Frome, perhaps because the central character is a young woman, flawed and realistic, who is able to deal with the consequences of her failed romance (however horrid they may be) rather than a brooding man who seems to think if he can't be in the relationship he wants, leaving his shrewish wife for a sweet young woman, he would rather not live. By the end, I was hoping for a happy ending for Charity.

I cannot deny that the ending of this book gave me quite an unwelcome shock as it suddenly verred away from the popular love story formula. However, when I actually thought about the ending I could understand why it was important for Wharton to ensure that this book had the same degree of social realism as her other books and therefore Charity and Lucius could not end up happily ever after. Although some reviewers found the ending unsatisfying I think found it more satisfying because it was realistic and therefore believable rather than being idealistic and fantastic. Also it therefore does not undermine Wharton's constant criticism of small town mentality, snobbery and narrow mindedness or Charity's independance and instinctive sense of propriety by having the good fairy come and sort out an impossible situation. If the ending had been predestined to be happy for Charity I do not think there would have been such an intense sense of suspense maintained throughout the book.

While certainly the product of a particular era, I was surprised at the route the book took, and at how sanguine I was about the ending. I like that the main character is introduced as, frankly, a little lazy and odd, but still worth following through to the end of the story. And for a free book, it is certainly better than others to which I've given a weekend's reading.

Once again Ms. Wharton tells a gripping story of class distinctions in the Victorian age. Yet how many times has this happened in our time? A lovely young woman of a lower class meets a handsome young man of the upper class. Slowly their relationship escalates from kisses to making love. A woman's first love is held on a pedestal. She believes every word that issues from his mouth. Charity, our heroine, finds herself pregnant after receiving a note from her lover that he has gone away and will return, yet gossip holds that he is marrying someone of his own class. The betrayal, the gut-wrenching pain, the tears, the fear--it's all there, 19th century, 20th or even the 21st. Yet Wharton doesn't take the easy way out of this situation. She keeps you guessing up to the very end, and I applaud her for her courage. Today, with our penchant for happy endings, we forget about real life. This is a book every teenage girl should read. It might give them a moment's pause before offering the unique gift of their virginity to a young man before marriage. Take it from someone who's been there.

Edith Wharton is clearly one America's best writers, not only of her time, but of all time. Much, if not all, of her writing clearly conveys real emotion, raw honesty and more than a glimpse of how oppressive life was to women in the early 20th Century. He novel, Summer, is no exception. I have read nearly all she has written and pulled down this novel for a second read (a rare thing indeed) and found it to be even better the second time around. Arguably her second best effort to The Age of Innocence (and differentiating between her works is difficult at best given the level at which she writes).

Charity, Lucius Harney, Mr. Royall and North Dormer leave lasting impressions on her readers as she paints her story of the summer and maturation of this young woman in a small and judgmental society. Wharton is able to describe and convey scenes, emotions and a young woman's coming of age in a way all writers should comb over again and again. Overstating her ability to write is quite literally impossible. A master. A timeless piece. A wonderful and powerful book.

Like _House of Mirth, Edith Wharton's 1917 short novel _Summer _ shows a relatively aware young woman being ground up by social convention. Wharton is so linked with Henry James that no one seems to have noticed the extent to which she was a late naturalist, chronicled inexorable destruction. An argument could be made that Charity is rescued from her hereditary fate up in the mountains (the Berkshires) and that the prime upholder of convention takes pity on her plight, but _Summer_ is close to _Ethan Frome_ in more than a New England location. More pragmatic than some of those confronted with destruction in other Wharton works, Charity makes the best of her very limited options, but happiness is more fleeting than a New England summer is.

The lack of female solidarity in _Summer_ is especially striking. Lily Bart had one devoted female friend. Charity has none, and the professional woman she turns to is far and away the most vicious character in the book.

Most of the book is about the blooming of a love crossing social boundaries that I find tedious. Others, including, I think Wharton herself, enjoyed chronicling Charity's first experience of love with an out-of-towner whose life and commitments are elsewhere, but for me it is the portrait of small-town busybodies and the eventual narrow corner into which Charity paints herself (with the help of social hypocrisy and her lack of education or any marketable skills ) that are interesting.

Susan Minot's introduction is helpful in placing the book within the course of Edith Wharton's life. A particularly important continuity across Wharton's work Minot observes is that "Wharton's heroines are not hapless victims; they understand their helplessness." I am not convinced that this enables them to keep their dignity, but the awareness of their plight and the unreasonability of social judgments heightens the tragedies (in contrast to Stephen Crane's _Maggie_ to take one example).