A wonderful book by
Edith Wharton (1905).
The story is of Lily Bart, a 29 year old woman who is living in the
gilded age in
New York. She is in
high society, is obssesd with
money and material things, and doesn't know what she wants. She controls people and feels the
strength of her triumph over anything that gets in her way.
At the age of 29 Lily lives with an aunt who offers
minimum, often grudging, hospitality and financial support. A
wealthy husband could satisfy her craving for
luxury and
admiration. Lily could have any man she wanted because of her immense beauty and charm, but Lily is reluctant to
consummate this kind of "deal."
In a
chronicle that richly details the follies of
shallowness, and
cruelties of
society as it illuminates Lily's own ambivalence about who and what she wants, Wharton traces her
heroine's decline from her elite position as a much-desired guest in
exclusive social events, to her role as a liaison between rich "outsiders" eager to be accepted in society but ignorant of its ways, to her
piteous existence when the homes of both old and new society are firmly, finally, closed to her.
On one level a
devastating satire of a world devoid of moral scruples, The House of Mirth is also a stringent
critique of the particular restrictions and limitations such a world imposes on
women. Lily is a woman not only of charm, but of
intelligence; her outward
beauty matched by a genuine, if undeveloped, appreciation of art and of nature's beauty. By succumbing to
society's definition of her as a beautiful object and nothing more, however, Lily in many ways authors her own fate.
Her
relationship with Mr. Selden is the main focus but other character include the very wealthy Mr. Rosedale. Both are somewhat after her and she is somewhat after them.
The House of Mirth was made into a movie in 2000, starring
Gillian Anderson as Lily.
Thanks to http://www.readinggroupguides.com/guides/house_of_mirth.html