Synopses & Reviews
Faced with an array of wealthy suitors, New York socialite Lily Bart falls in love with lawyer Lawrence Selden, whose lack of money spoils their chances for happiness together. Dubious business deals and accusations of liaisons with a married man diminish Lily's social status, and as she makes one bad choice after another, she learns how venal and brutally unforgiving the upper crust of New York can be. One of America's finest novels of manners, The House of Mirth is a beautifully written and ultimately tragic account of the human capacity for cruelty.
Synopsis
In charting the course of Lily's life and downfall, Edith Wharton also provides a wider picture of a society in transition, a world in which old certainties, manners, and morals no longer hold true, and where the individual has become an expendable commodity. Contextual materials include Wharton's correspondence about the novel, period articles on social mores, etiquette, and dress, and contemporary writings by Henry James, Thorstein Veblen, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman.