Age of Innocence

Rating:
Summary: Hypocrisy of the Age of Innocence
Review: The Age of Innocence is a thought provoking literary piece which I enjoyed immensely. It is written in a simple, accessible style, yet deeply portrays human emotions and interactions in late 19th century New York City. This novel represents an account of high society life of the 1870s. The events of this novel are wrapped around a prevailing lifestyle of jealousy, shame, and excessive pride which colors the main characters. Not unlike many other segments of the society, then and now, the characters of this novel attempt to disguise these feelings through hypocrisy and deception.
In a time where keeping appearances is everything, the protagonist, Newland Archer, is at conflict with himself. He is engaged to May Welland, who represents stability and the traditional high society life. He begins to fall in love, however, with May's cousin, Countess Ellen Olenska. After seeing Ellen and her freedom and spontaneity, he begins to question his life and why he feels the need to conform. He realizes how dull his life is and how materialistic and fake the high society aristocrats are. He loves May, but cannot stand the idea of living such a predictable life with no deeper meaning. In the end, he must choose between living the life he is expected to live with May, or being happy with Ellen, yet ruining the family name.

Rating:
Summary: Great literature; really deserves to be more widely read!
Review: "The Age of Innocence" is a wonderful read on many levels for all kinds of readers. It shouldn't just appeal to "literature" buffs but also to romance readers, those interested in history or psychology, and anyone looking for an interesting and involving story.

Wharton weaves an intriguing tale of New York society in the late 19th century, where old ways have not yet made way for "modern" views, but it's evident that it is only a matter of time. For example, what would have been considered socially unacceptable in Newland and May Archer's time, such as marrying your mistress after your wife dies, is perfectly alright by the time May and Newland's son, Dallas, is ready to marry. Dallas is to marry the daughter of the previously mentioned union, demonstrating that by the early 20th century, the old social conventions of Old New York have gone by the wayside. Unfortunately this didn't happen in time for Newland and the Countess, and in fact, it appears that he wishes that everything could remain the same as it was in his youth, which is seen by his reaction to Countess Olenska at the end of the novel.

What makes the book truly great, though, is Wharton's detail of EVERYthing, from how a dinner was served, to an evening at the opera, and more. It's almost impossible not to enter the mind of the characters; they are so completely and complexly developed that this book should be required reading for every writer!

I really give this book 4 1/2 stars; the only reason it isn't 5 stars is because the ending was a little disappointing to me, although it was quite in keeping with the characters and the story. We tend to satisfy our curiosity as soon as possible, but a hundred years ago one had to look at other issues as more important than personal satisfaction.

Rating:
Summary: Tension between individualism and confomity
Review: Edith's book talks about the tension between following one's heart and loyalty to societal expectations. Case in point, Newland Archer.

Torn by his loyalty to his wife-to-be, who repesents tradition and stability of Old New York society and the soon-to-be divorce, who represents the worldly bohemian life of the Old World, namely European. Mr. Archer has a major dilemma since he's both has both progressive and conservative views. He has very progressive views on art, literature, politics, etc., while at the same time have conservative views on romance. It's the dilemma of most upper class and professional men even in these progressive and liberal times. Most men want stability in their lives, they want a "May Welland" type over the outspoken and unpredictable "Ellen Olenska".

Let me get back to the issue at hand, the choices of Newland Archer. Newland seemed to want to have it both ways. He wants to marry May and have Ellen as his secret lover. Knowing that New York society frowns on such things, Ellen decides to leave New York for Europe, therefore annul that possiblity. In the meantime, Newland became a devoted husband to May until her death.

Rating:
Summary: surprisingly fluid and entertaining:
Review: Generally I don't care for books written by anyone with an agenda. Now of course most self-serving and overwhelmingly too serious tomes aren't particularly worthwhile, those of partisans attacking their equal and opposite extreme. This book was surely written in a heightened and urgent time of deep disgust for the author. She had recently been divorced, ending a loveless marriage to someone history tells us (now, in hindsight and considering the superior accomplishments of his former wife) was something of a jerk. Edith sat down in those moments of disillusion mired in a confusing, overwhelming state of newfound personal freedom and ranted out this smart, funny and throughly entertaining book about how stupid and petty she believed some of her contemporaries and ancestors to be.

It doesn't matter whether we agree with Wharton's viewpoint or not--that isn't necessary to enjoy this book. One of the criticisms of male authors of this era (and prior as well as today) is that they are unable to represent realistic female characters. In most cases this is true, but it is also true with their male characters--self-serving drones who stand in for self-important authors. It was the rare author who was frequently overpraised for somehow 'understanding' women (I am thinking specifically here of Henry James) as if the author-as-God would be otherwise unable to know the thoughts of their creations. The truth is that someone like James and, more to the point here, someone like Edith Wharton, were wonderful character profilers. Wharton's male characters are very true-to-life considering the limitations of the world they exist in. Her female characters seem more to be like cardboard with the obvious exceptions of the primaries. Wharton's agenda, here, regardless of what various generations of literary types of forced onto the meaning of this novel, appears to be quite simply an attack on the world she grew up in. Now this is of course the usual path for self-conscious and self-important writers struggling over their first or second novels and using the often fragmented premises of their own lives as some sort of baited self-therapy exercise, but with Wharton there is something different in her execution. Perhaps it is because she managed to lose herself in the varying paths of her characters and understood the realities of telling a story that she was able to get away from many of the excesses of this usually annoying genre of self-exposure. Maybe she was just a better writer than all of these whining and silly ladies who worship/imitated her repeatedly and timelessly only in their own vision they supplied a shrill sort of political statement believing that their godmother would somehow approve.

I know that I somehow got off track of reviewing this mostly excellent book--four and a half stars more likely for its constant and beautiful evocation of a world gone by, rounded down, simply, because so many other people attempt to prove the validity of their own inhibitions based on a personal connection to something vague they misread in a book that had nothing to do with them.

Recommended with a huff of enthusiasm and an irritable reply to anyone who imagines they truly understand the rage Ms. Wharton was speaking of--

Rating:
Summary: One of the best books I've read
Review: I enjoyed every word of this book. It just captivated me. I'm glad Wharton chose the sentimental ending rather than going for the melodramatic.

Rating:
Summary: Absolutely Breathtaking
Review: On a 5 star scale, this is a 7. The Age of Innocence is about New York society in the late 1800's. Wharton's fast paced dialogue is unequivocally the best I have ever read. The reader is not only pulled in immediately but comes quickly to understand the nonverbal communication inherent in the interchanges. This is the heart of the story - the things that are not said, the things that are not done in New York society at that time and how the rigid rules of that society were enforced without ever explicitly saying any of it. In Mrs. Wharton's words: "It was the old New York way of taking life "without effusion of blood": the way of people who dreaded scandal more than disease, who placed decency above courage, and who considered that nothing was more ill-bred than "scenes," except the behaviour of those who gave them. " This is as much a story about the mores of New York society as it is a bitter love story of two people caught up in it.

Newland Archer represents New York society as a young man of high society blissfully engaged to equally prominent May Welland. The reader comes to know him and the story is told through his eyes. It is through him that we come to understand "the rules". When Countess Ellen Olenska returns from a ruined marriage abroad, everything in Newland's structured view of society is challenged. It is as if a veil is lifted from his eyes and he can suddenly see the big picture from multiple points of view. However, one of the facets of "the rules" is to be blind to these angles and once empowered to see, he belongs neither to New York or to the world at large. He has only the choice of destroying all that he knows in pursuit of the mysterious woman who has brought about this change or living a life whose values for him have lost their luster. She, on the other hand, has come to see the value to the ideas that have had Newland so rigidly encased. Together they are a ringing disavowal and endorsement at the same time.

This is not an indictment of that society. Ms. Wharton had condemned it early in her life but eventually found a value in the way that things were done and reflects that sentiment in Madame Olenska who, having had her eyes opened could never fully return.
"... if it's not worthwhile to have given up, to have missed things, so that others may be saved from disillusionment and misery - then everything I came home for, everything that made my other life seem by contrast so bare and so poor because no one there took account of them - all these things are a sham or a dream. "

This is not your typical love story and there have been no spoilers given here. In the end, you will feel that the characters have done what is right; however, in this book, it is the definition of right that is being questioned.


Rating:
Summary: Amazing
Review: She writes the way Samuel Richardson would have if he was fast-fowarded a century or so. Lovely book, and full of the people you always wanted to meet.

Rating:
Summary: Totem and taboo in old New York.
Review: The reading public must have been taken by shock when, in 1920, Wharton published this novel. Written off by most of the critics and audience of her time as having her best literary years far behind her, she produced what is arguably her most important work. Her story of New York City in the 1870s, where family name and propriety counted as much as accumulated wealth, resonated with readers who were just beginning to catch hints of the looming social revolution that would come later in the decade - and once again shatter time tested institutions. Wharton's looking back to the time of her youth (she was 57 when the book was published) is neither too sentimental nor too critical, but simply a fond remembrance of the time and place in which she lived and, like Madame Olenska, eventually escaped.

However, it is not with Madame Olenska but with Newland Archer that Wharton is closest associated. Belonging to similar social castes, both the author and Newland are able to see the foibles in their social milieu but in no way are ready to discard it totally. Whereas, in the end, both are ready to follow their individual paths from Old New York they are fully aware of what is expected of them as members of this society, and act accordingly. This is the central theme of the novel: individual desire vs. collective propriety. In the hands of a lesser author, this conflict could have resulted in a quite heavy and didactic work - and as interesting as an evening at a needlepoint demonstration. By clothing her novel in the time tested mantle of a love story, she is given rein to employ her talents to the fullest. In short, she re-creates the New York City of the 1870s and peoples it with characters that seem to be historical, not just based on historical models. The characters of Madame Olenska, Newland, May Welland and, especially, Mrs. Manson Mingott are wonderfully drawn and never become stereotyped nor trivialized; in fact, they are so lifelike that the reader (as if knowing them for years) is able to anticipate their thought patterns and actions. And of course, there is the city itself - before the Holland Tunnel, Grand Central Station, subways and telephone, where 39th Street was considered the hinterland. Wharton treats the city with affection as well as with the critical eye of the archaeologist attempting to reconstruct some long past civilization.

Especially fine is the final chapter in which Wharton (in less than twenty pages) summarizes the life of Newland from the time of his parting with Madame Olenska to his life in early twentieth century New York. The economy of her prose in this final chapter combined with her justaposition of sentimental reflection and historical fact are first rate. Particularly moving is the final scene in which the reader leaves Newland sitting on a bench outside of Madame Olenska's apartment in Paris unable (and unwilling) to abrogate both his loyalty to his now deceased wife, May, nor the unrequited love that he still has for Madame Olenska.

Rating:
Summary: Totem and taboo in old New York.
Review: The reading public must have been taken by shock when, in 1920, Wharton published this novel. Written off by most of the critics and audience of her time as having her best literary years far behind her, she produced what is arguably her most important work. Her story of New York City in the 1870s, where family name and propriety counted as much as accumulated wealth, resonated with readers who were just beginning to catch hints of the looming social revolution that would come later in the decade - and once again shatter time tested institutions. Wharton's looking back to the time of her youth (she was 57 when the book was published) is neither too sentimental nor too critical, but simply a fond remembrance of the time and place in which she lived and, like Madame Olenska, eventually escaped.

However, it is not with Madame Olenska but with Newland Archer that Wharton is closest associated. Belonging to similar social castes, both the author and Newland are able to see the foibles in their social milieu but in no way are ready to discard it totally. Whereas, in the end, both are ready to follow their individual paths from Old New York they are fully aware of what is expected of them as members of this society, and act accordingly. This is the central theme of the novel: individual desire vs. collective propriety. In the hands of a lesser author, this conflict could have resulted in a quite heavy and didactic work - and as interesting as an evening at a needlepoint demonstration. By clothing her novel in the time tested mantle of a love story, she is given rein to employ her talents to the fullest. In short, she re-creates the New York City of the 1870s and peoples it with characters that seem to be historical, not just based on historical models. The characters of Madame Olenska, Newland, May Welland and, especially, Mrs. Manson Mingott are wonderfully drawn and never become stereotyped nor trivialized; in fact, they are so lifelike that the reader (as if knowing them for years) is able to anticipate their thought patterns and actions. And of course, there is the city itself - before the Holland Tunnel, Grand Central Station, subways and telephone, where 39th Street was considered the hinterland. Wharton treats the city with affection as well as with the critical eye of the archaeologist attempting to reconstruct some long past civilization.

Especially fine is the final chapter in which Wharton (in less than twenty pages) summarizes the life of Newland from the time of his parting with Madame Olenska to his life in early twentieth century New York. The economy of her prose in this final chapter combined with her justaposition of sentimental reflection and historical fact are first rate. Particularly moving is the final scene in which the reader leaves Newland sitting on a bench outside of Madame Olenska's apartment in Paris unable (and unwilling) to abrogate both his loyalty to his now deceased wife, May, nor the unrequited love that he still has for Madame Olenska.

Rating:
Summary: wonderful portrait of old New York high society
Review: This book paints a fantastic portrait of the tightly controlling high society of the late 1800's New York and it's repression of individuality. Wharton tells the story of Newland Archer, a young man raised in this society, but who possesses a unique ability to question the rules. During his engagement to May Welland, he meets a woman of questionable background who knocks down the beliefs embedded in him through his upbringing. The story of their relationship and its effect on his marriage show the tensions in this society and how its members worked to preserve their culture. Early in the book, the abundant details of dress and decoration of the times become tedious, but Wharton's portrait of individuals, their thoughts, and how the society affected their life choices is masterful. An enjoyable and educational read.