The Age of Innocence

Fun bookmark!

Author: Edith Wharton

Category: I first read this about 10 years ago, and it ignited my utter love of and complete devotion to Edith Wharton.

My thoughts: It’s such a treat to read this book again! Edith Wharton won a very well-deserved Pulitzer Prize for writing this, and it’s easy to see why. This book is an absolute gem—a great story told by a master.

The main character of The Age of Innocence is Newland Archer, a product of upper-class late-nineteenth-century New York society. He is engaged to another product of this society, May Welland (Winona Ryder played May in the movie version of The Age of Innocence, and I can’t help but picture her as I read the book, even though May has blonde hair in the novel). However, their little world is disrupted by the arrival of Countess Olenska (what a great name), May’s cousin, who decamped to America to escape an abusive husband in Europe. Newland is at first sort of irritated by her presence, but soon becomes intrigued by her. Because she lived abroad most of her life, Ellen Olenska is different in ways that intrigue Archer. For Ellen, I think, Archer represents stability—which she never had during her nomadic upbringing or in her marriage. They fall for each other—but under some very impossible circumstances. Of course, Newland and Ellen are living at a time when divorce is a gigantic no-no. The whole of society seems to be forcing them apart.

I like how Edith Wharton depicts the slow burn of attraction and love that occurs between Newland and Ellen. The two only kiss a couple of times, but each encounter between them is quietly erotic. The Age of Innocence is mainly told from Newland’s point of view, but the novel, I think, is really about the women. Ellen Olenska and May Welland are very intriguing characters. May has the appearance of a placid milquetoast. She’s called childlike several times in the novel, but Wharton also compares her to Diana quite a few times. Toward the end of the book, a part of May’s personality is shown that suddenly renders her more complicated than her image suggests. Ellen Olenksa, for her part, seems like she’d be fun to hang out with. She is smart, loyal, and possesses a very hard-earned wisdom. She is sort like a tougher version of Isabel Archer. And then there’s Granny Mingott, May and Ellen’s venerable old grandmother who says and does the things that only older people can say and do—and get away with.

Another interesting female character is Medora Manson, Ellen and May’s weird aunt, who, if she existed now, would be some sort of New Age former hippie. I love Edith Wharton’s description of her outfit when Newland meets her: “This lady, who was long, lean and loosely put together, was clad in raiment intricately looped and fringed, with plaids and stripes and bands of plain color disposed in a design to which the clue seemed to missing.” Ha! This made me wonder how Edith Wharton would describe the outfits of hipsters.

I never noticed until now how literary The Age of Innocence is. Wharton mentions poetry by Tennyson (yay!), Robert Browning, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. It warmed my little English major heart! I got the urge to dig out my Victorian poetry book from grad school and reread “The Lotus Eaters” and “How they brought the good news from Ghent to Aix.” I have to say that although I love Tennyson, I’m not a big fan of “The Lotus Eaters” (neither is May Welland).

I had forgotten how melancholy the last chapter of this novel is. It has a wistful, almost sad tone, but is not maudlin. The last chapter highlights an element that has been prominent character in the entire novel—change. The novel starts in the 1870s and ends and ends about a quarter of a century later. During this time, the elements of change shift the strict mores of New York society, the face of New York itself, and the world outside the insular community in which the characters live.

Great passage: There were certain things that had to be done, and if done at all, done handsomely and thoroughly; and one of these in the old New York code, was the tribal rally around a kinswoman about to be eliminated from the tribe.

Up next: The Shooting Party