Newland Archer is a wealthy lawyer of upper-class New York society, who is engaged to be married to May, a member of the same society. Wharton writes with such insight into the human psyche, and her ending of Age of Innocence is finely nuanced and multi-layered. He is determined that NO ONE shall sully this core any more, as they did once upon a time. Perhaps the greatest love is the one that remains unconsummated, like the lovers painted on the Grecian urn (in Keats’ ‘Ode to a Grecian Urn’), who touch, but not quite, and are frozen in this limbo on the urn. My The Age of Innocence Review I’ve been drawn to this novel for ages.
Ellen is outspoken, bold, and wants more out of life. There was no use in trying to emancipate a wife who had not the dimmest notion that she was not free; and he had long since discovered that May’s only use of the liberty she supposed herself to possess would be to lay it on the altar of her wifely adoration. A self described dilettante who goes through the motions of being a lawyer, in an office where he has little to do. There are “inexorable conventions” and customs and rules. Archer is the father of three adult or near-adult children, and a widower. Thanks for the comment. His days were full, and they were filled decently. May would be left husband-less. Ruled by well laid conventions, Newland believes him to be happy and content and eagerly awaits his impending marriage. I wonder if there isn’t also an awareness of the fleeting nature of the grand passion. Newland Archer remains a complete gentleman – true to his wife and deep inside, true to his great love Ellen Olenska. The blurb on GR gives a good summary so I will start with that as the first paragraph: The most perfect ending in literature - I'll never get over it.
There were a hundred million tickets in his lottery, and there was only one prize; the chances had been too decidedly against him.
Yet, here’s the thing, and I think it goes back to my original question about why Archer walks away at the end of the novel.
“The real loneliness is living among all these kind people who only ask one to pretend!”. The story centers around a man named Newland Archer. But then her mysterious cousin arrives from Europe, Countess Ellen Olenska married to a brute a Polish nobleman who repeatedly degrades her, showing contempt for their marriage by parading lowly women in front of the Countess. to what literary movement does this book belongs Modernism or realism or naturalism, See all 11 questions about The Age of Innocence…, Eels: An Exploration, from New Zealand to the Sargasso, of the World's Most Mysterious Fish, Wedding March (from A Midsummer Night’s Dream), 2020 April The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton. Ultimately, Newland chose to live by the accepted rules of his class and times.
My daughter is the big Edie fan in the family, and her interest got me to read several. They would have been slicing away the sinews and tissues that intimately integrated them into the body of their clan. Summoning the vague ideas that I had about 1920’s New York, I pictured smoky clubs and laughing ladies in fur-lined cloaks and peacock feather hats.
He may be a bit rueful but he’s made and lived a deep commitment to his clan. Historians say that she showed an interest in writing from a very early age, despite little to no support from her family and friends. If you turn to the Wikipedia page (not exactly hardcore research, I know but I'm not in a position to march off to the library and start wading through Wharton's presumably numerous biographies) you'll be faced with a picture of a timid and pretty dour looking lady with two disagreeable looking Paris-Hilton porta-dogs plonked on her knee. But The Age of Innocence has as much in common with that popular Oprah-ish romance-rooted literary fashion as Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet does. I think you’re right that it includes that sense of an awareness or fear of the end of grand passion. I don’t want to spoil the ending, but I admire the choice she makes, and I think that it was the only way she could have lived the life she imagined. That vision, faint and tenuous as it was, had kept him from thinking of other women. Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. This novel did win the Pulitzer Prize for literature in 1921 and boy did it deserve it. Are you looking only for new postings in May? He supposed it was all a man ought to ask. Poor Ellen as the relatives call her, living with an unconventional grandmother Mrs. Manson Mingott so obese she needs help to get up, nevertheless the lady is the head of the family and people listen to, even though she has strange ways then again very rich but... stingy. In the end, the clan was more important for him than the woman. Yes, there is an open-endedness to the final pages. Before I jump into the novel, I want to give you all a little bit of background on the author, Edith Wharton. [Archer seems to have fallen back into his old groove, but he feels that he’s missed out on “the flower of life.” When he’s given an opportunity to see Ellen once again, he resists, thinking that the memory of his association with her will be more vivid and real if he doesn’t see her again. Patrick T Reardon | Writer, Essayist, Poet, Chicago Historian, Book review: “The Hunted” by Elmore Leonard, Book review: “Gislebertus: Sculptor of Autun” by Denis Grivot and George Zarnecki, Book review: “Columbus: The Four Voyages” by Laurence Bergreen, http://bronasbooks.blogspot.com.au/2014/04/the-wharton-review-2014.html. Sign up with your email address to receive our monthly newsletter! Why, on the final page of Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence, does Archer walk away from a chance to visit Ellen Olenska, the love of his life, for the first time in 25 years?
He stands by the choice he once made, but that doesn’t mean he loves Ellen Olenska any less. The story is set in the 1870s, in upper-class, "Gilded-Age" New York City. She is perhaps the most feminist character in the story, and she is also my favorite.
My interest in the Gilded Age stems from the fact that I grew up in Southern Rhode Island. While Newland admires Ellen, he knows that he is married and must stay faithful to his wife. But then her mysterious cousin arrives from Europe, Countess, Appearances can be deceiving as this superb classic novel reveals...Newland Archer has the perfect life rich young and good looking, a member in excellent standing of New York's High Society of 1871 during the Golden Age. At first glance, it seems so dry, so suggestive of sweeping historical detail. You should read it as Wharton’s manifesto to a world that she lived in and loved, but was also able to criticize. Which one of these 2 editions of 'The Age of Innocence' is the original? With these habits none might interfere; and one of them demanded that his wife and daughter should always go with him on his annual journey to the south. Dozens of “cottages,” or, large mansions if we’re being honest, line a street called Bellevue Avenue, and I grew up admiring them. Could a young teen read this? For Newland Archer, the leading male character, there is an imagining of an alternative existence to the one that convention has pressed upon him, he has built within himself a kind of sanctuary for his secret thoughts and longings.
His son has gone up, but Archer doesn’t follow him. Patrick T Reardon © 2020. Newland is engaged to a beautiful charming girl May Welland also in the exclusive association, who loves him. It was deeply distasteful to him to do anything melodramatic and conspicuous…. Her family even comes up with a scheme to trick Ellen into going back to Europe. I think the clan thing is in there, too, and I stressed that in my review because my book club — of guys 63-75 — were seeing the book (positively and negatively) as a love story. But he thought of it now as a thing so unattainable and improbable that to have repined would have been like despairing because one had not drawn the first prize in a lottery. Newland had been told about the possibility only a few hours earlier, after 26 years of suppression. Thanks for your comment. Though the committee had initially agreed to give the award to Sinclair Lewis for Main Street, the judges, in rejecting his book on political grounds, "established Wharton as the … From group to group, values will be different, and ways of expression will be different, but, at heart, they all share the same tension between the needs of individuals and the needs of the community. Archer, of course, is about to marry May.
Required fields are marked *. One of my favourite books which I keep – with longer and shorter intervals – rereading since my youth.
Any attempt to divorce him could bring scandal to her name. Or, two, if you count the author’s story. What he learns, as time passes and Ellen Olenska has departed from his life, is to keep pure within himself his love for her and their grand passion. Would you want links to these two Wharton reviews and some earlier ones? When her husband was diagnosed with a... To see what your friends thought of this book. The youngest of three children, Edith spent her early years touring Europe with her parents and, upon the family's return to the United States, enjoyed a privileged childhood in New York and Newport, Rhode Island. There are many benefits to reading this beautifully written novel. Pat, You need not be right, Pat.
After all, “writer” isn’t the occupation of a lady. And, ultimately, that’s what Archer wants to do. All tribes are insular, but New York society in The Age of Innocence is particularly so. And, then, suddenly, in the final pages of the novel, it is a quarter of a century later, near the turn of the century. August 26th 2004 Careful reading suggests that Wharton leaves open thew possibility that Dallas arranges fro Newland and Ellen to meet over lunch the following day, before he and his father catch the train that evening. Before writing this review I decided to find out a bit more about Edith Wharton. Mr. Welland was a mild and silent man, with no opinions but with many habits.
Wharton writes with such insight into the human psyche, and her ending of Age of Innocence is finely nuanced and multi-layered.
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Ellen is outspoken, bold, and wants more out of life. There was no use in trying to emancipate a wife who had not the dimmest notion that she was not free; and he had long since discovered that May’s only use of the liberty she supposed herself to possess would be to lay it on the altar of her wifely adoration. A self described dilettante who goes through the motions of being a lawyer, in an office where he has little to do. There are “inexorable conventions” and customs and rules. Archer is the father of three adult or near-adult children, and a widower. Thanks for the comment. His days were full, and they were filled decently. May would be left husband-less. Ruled by well laid conventions, Newland believes him to be happy and content and eagerly awaits his impending marriage. I wonder if there isn’t also an awareness of the fleeting nature of the grand passion. Newland Archer remains a complete gentleman – true to his wife and deep inside, true to his great love Ellen Olenska. The blurb on GR gives a good summary so I will start with that as the first paragraph: The most perfect ending in literature - I'll never get over it.
There were a hundred million tickets in his lottery, and there was only one prize; the chances had been too decidedly against him.
Yet, here’s the thing, and I think it goes back to my original question about why Archer walks away at the end of the novel.
“The real loneliness is living among all these kind people who only ask one to pretend!”. The story centers around a man named Newland Archer. But then her mysterious cousin arrives from Europe, Countess Ellen Olenska married to a brute a Polish nobleman who repeatedly degrades her, showing contempt for their marriage by parading lowly women in front of the Countess. to what literary movement does this book belongs Modernism or realism or naturalism, See all 11 questions about The Age of Innocence…, Eels: An Exploration, from New Zealand to the Sargasso, of the World's Most Mysterious Fish, Wedding March (from A Midsummer Night’s Dream), 2020 April The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton. Ultimately, Newland chose to live by the accepted rules of his class and times.
My daughter is the big Edie fan in the family, and her interest got me to read several. They would have been slicing away the sinews and tissues that intimately integrated them into the body of their clan. Summoning the vague ideas that I had about 1920’s New York, I pictured smoky clubs and laughing ladies in fur-lined cloaks and peacock feather hats.
He may be a bit rueful but he’s made and lived a deep commitment to his clan. Historians say that she showed an interest in writing from a very early age, despite little to no support from her family and friends. If you turn to the Wikipedia page (not exactly hardcore research, I know but I'm not in a position to march off to the library and start wading through Wharton's presumably numerous biographies) you'll be faced with a picture of a timid and pretty dour looking lady with two disagreeable looking Paris-Hilton porta-dogs plonked on her knee. But The Age of Innocence has as much in common with that popular Oprah-ish romance-rooted literary fashion as Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet does. I think you’re right that it includes that sense of an awareness or fear of the end of grand passion. I don’t want to spoil the ending, but I admire the choice she makes, and I think that it was the only way she could have lived the life she imagined. That vision, faint and tenuous as it was, had kept him from thinking of other women. Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. This novel did win the Pulitzer Prize for literature in 1921 and boy did it deserve it. Are you looking only for new postings in May? He supposed it was all a man ought to ask. Poor Ellen as the relatives call her, living with an unconventional grandmother Mrs. Manson Mingott so obese she needs help to get up, nevertheless the lady is the head of the family and people listen to, even though she has strange ways then again very rich but... stingy. In the end, the clan was more important for him than the woman. Yes, there is an open-endedness to the final pages. Before I jump into the novel, I want to give you all a little bit of background on the author, Edith Wharton. [Archer seems to have fallen back into his old groove, but he feels that he’s missed out on “the flower of life.” When he’s given an opportunity to see Ellen once again, he resists, thinking that the memory of his association with her will be more vivid and real if he doesn’t see her again. Patrick T Reardon | Writer, Essayist, Poet, Chicago Historian, Book review: “The Hunted” by Elmore Leonard, Book review: “Gislebertus: Sculptor of Autun” by Denis Grivot and George Zarnecki, Book review: “Columbus: The Four Voyages” by Laurence Bergreen, http://bronasbooks.blogspot.com.au/2014/04/the-wharton-review-2014.html. Sign up with your email address to receive our monthly newsletter! Why, on the final page of Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence, does Archer walk away from a chance to visit Ellen Olenska, the love of his life, for the first time in 25 years?
He stands by the choice he once made, but that doesn’t mean he loves Ellen Olenska any less. The story is set in the 1870s, in upper-class, "Gilded-Age" New York City. She is perhaps the most feminist character in the story, and she is also my favorite.
My interest in the Gilded Age stems from the fact that I grew up in Southern Rhode Island. While Newland admires Ellen, he knows that he is married and must stay faithful to his wife. But then her mysterious cousin arrives from Europe, Countess, Appearances can be deceiving as this superb classic novel reveals...Newland Archer has the perfect life rich young and good looking, a member in excellent standing of New York's High Society of 1871 during the Golden Age. At first glance, it seems so dry, so suggestive of sweeping historical detail. You should read it as Wharton’s manifesto to a world that she lived in and loved, but was also able to criticize. Which one of these 2 editions of 'The Age of Innocence' is the original? With these habits none might interfere; and one of them demanded that his wife and daughter should always go with him on his annual journey to the south. Dozens of “cottages,” or, large mansions if we’re being honest, line a street called Bellevue Avenue, and I grew up admiring them. Could a young teen read this? For Newland Archer, the leading male character, there is an imagining of an alternative existence to the one that convention has pressed upon him, he has built within himself a kind of sanctuary for his secret thoughts and longings.
His son has gone up, but Archer doesn’t follow him. Patrick T Reardon © 2020. Newland is engaged to a beautiful charming girl May Welland also in the exclusive association, who loves him. It was deeply distasteful to him to do anything melodramatic and conspicuous…. Her family even comes up with a scheme to trick Ellen into going back to Europe. I think the clan thing is in there, too, and I stressed that in my review because my book club — of guys 63-75 — were seeing the book (positively and negatively) as a love story. But he thought of it now as a thing so unattainable and improbable that to have repined would have been like despairing because one had not drawn the first prize in a lottery. Newland had been told about the possibility only a few hours earlier, after 26 years of suppression. Thanks for your comment. Though the committee had initially agreed to give the award to Sinclair Lewis for Main Street, the judges, in rejecting his book on political grounds, "established Wharton as the … From group to group, values will be different, and ways of expression will be different, but, at heart, they all share the same tension between the needs of individuals and the needs of the community. Archer, of course, is about to marry May.
Required fields are marked *. One of my favourite books which I keep – with longer and shorter intervals – rereading since my youth.
Any attempt to divorce him could bring scandal to her name. Or, two, if you count the author’s story. What he learns, as time passes and Ellen Olenska has departed from his life, is to keep pure within himself his love for her and their grand passion. Would you want links to these two Wharton reviews and some earlier ones? When her husband was diagnosed with a... To see what your friends thought of this book. The youngest of three children, Edith spent her early years touring Europe with her parents and, upon the family's return to the United States, enjoyed a privileged childhood in New York and Newport, Rhode Island. There are many benefits to reading this beautifully written novel. Pat, You need not be right, Pat.
After all, “writer” isn’t the occupation of a lady. And, ultimately, that’s what Archer wants to do. All tribes are insular, but New York society in The Age of Innocence is particularly so. And, then, suddenly, in the final pages of the novel, it is a quarter of a century later, near the turn of the century. August 26th 2004 Careful reading suggests that Wharton leaves open thew possibility that Dallas arranges fro Newland and Ellen to meet over lunch the following day, before he and his father catch the train that evening. Before writing this review I decided to find out a bit more about Edith Wharton. Mr. Welland was a mild and silent man, with no opinions but with many habits.
Wharton writes with such insight into the human psyche, and her ending of Age of Innocence is finely nuanced and multi-layered.
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