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The Age of Innocence

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Writer:

Edith Wharton was an American novelist, short story writer, and designer. Wharton drew upon her insiders knowledge of the upper class New York "aristocracy" to realistically portray the lives and morals of the Gilded Age. In 1921, she became the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize in Literature, for her novel The Age of Innocence. She was inducted into the National Womens Hall of Fame in 1996. Among her other well known works are the The House of Mirth and the novella Ethan Frome.

Story:

Winner of the 1921 Pulitzer Prize, The Age of Innocence is Edith Wharton’s masterful portrait of desire and betrayal during the sumptuous Golden Age of Old New York, a time when society people “dreaded scandal more than disease.”

This is Newland Archer’s world as he prepares to marry the beautiful but conventional May Welland. But when the mysterious Countess Ellen Olenska returns to New York after a disastrous marriage, Archer falls deeply in love with her. Torn between duty and passion, Archer struggles to make a decision that will either courageously define his life—or mercilessly destroy it. (r.2)

A tale of nineteenth-century New York high society in which a young lawyer falls in love with a woman separated from her husband, while he is engaged to the womans cousin.(r.

Sillerton Jackson:

Mr. Sillerton Jackson is the social guru of Archers world. Hes got the history of all the New York families in his head. He knows whos married whom, which family is connected to which and how, and what qualities are characteristic of each family. Hes representative of old New York; the even stodgier, even more class-conscious New York of Archers mothers generation.

Lemuel Struthers:

Mrs. Struthers throws Sunday parties to which she invites intellectuals and artists. These parties aren’t considered proper for members of high society to attend, and Mrs. Struthers is considered “common” because her husband made his money through the shoe polish industry. Ellen shows her lack of understanding of society’s rules by attending Mrs. Struthers’s parties for a taste of the artistic side of New York.

Newland Archer

The novels protagonist. Archer is a wealthy young lawyer married to the beautiful debutante May Welland. He is in love, however, with Mays cousin Countess Ellen Olenska, who represents to him the freedom missing from the suffocating environment of the New York aristocracy. Archer is torn between his duty to May and to his family, and his passion for Ellen. In the end, he remains faithful to his wife and comes to be known in society as a philanthropist and civic figure.

Countess Ellen Olenska

Mays cousin and Mrs. Manson Mingotts granddaughter. Ellen was educated and

raised in Europe. There, she married a Polish count, who cheated on her and prompted her to leave him. Upon her return to New York family, she hopes to be reintegrated to American life, but she finds only judgmentality and stifling mores. Her behavior is deemed too unorthodox for her to fit in to Old New York. To Archer, however, she is free and truly alive, her own person.

Julius Beaufort

He is a wealthy finance dude whose origins are mysterious— he "passes" as an Englishman— but has somehow managed to marry a woman from a prominent family named Regina Dallas.

In the beginning of the novel, he is on top of the world. He and his wife host lavish balls and sponsor polo matches for men and archery competitions for women. Everyone knows he keeps a mistress and he appears to be chasing after Madame Olenska. But society looks the other way because hes such a generous man-about-town.

Later in the novel, however, his finances collapse after he gets creative with his investors funds. Shunned by society, he and his wife leave town. When his wife dies, he marries Fanny Ring and has a daughter, Fanny Beaufort. They end up in Buenos Aires, where he prospers as an insurance agent. All’s well that ends well?

Try as we might, we just cant think of Julius Beaufort as a villain. A villain needs to be up against good guys. If Mr. Beaufort wears the black hat that would mean that New York society is wearing the white hat… and we all know that New York society is seriously messed-up. The novel is so critical of how puritanical, small-minded, and status-conscious this society is that Mr. Beaufort doesnt sound all the bad by comparison.

Like other, more "European" characters such as the Duke of St. Austrey and Madame Olenska, Mr. Beaufort is more "democratic": he socializes across class lines. He might be a skirt-chaser and a criminal, but at least he isnt snooty.

Highlights vs self- reflection:

1. He saw his marriage becoming a dull association of material and social interests held together by ignorance on the one side and hypocrisy on the other.

2.p.262: If marriage was a dull duty, as long as it kept the dignity of a duty:lapsing form that, it became a mere battle of ugly appetities. Looking about him, he honored his own past, and mourned for it. After all, there was good in the old ways.

A life without art is like a fish without water. The arrow could shoot to the aim, but end up with meaningless goal.

3. p.93:a pleasant glow dilated archers heart. there was nothing extraordinary in the tale any woman would have done as much for a neighbours child. but it was just like Ellen he felt to have rushed in bareheaded, carrying the boy in her arms and to have dazzled poor Mrs. Winsett into forgetting to ask who she was.

Ellen has a sense of sympathy, while May has a sense of supremacist.

4.p.129: I had nothing to fear from that letter:absolutely nothing! All I feared was to bring notoriety, scandl, on the family-on you and May.

Elles has agape love, while May has ego love

5.p.219:A stolen kiss isn’t what I want…I can sit perfectly still beside you, like this, with that other vision in my mind, just quietly trusting to it to come true.

Agape love brings blissful peace and deep blessing

Golden Sentence:

1.Like a lone sailor adrift for years on alien seas, he wakes one night to discover familiar constellations overhead.

2.p.156:The small bright lawn stretched away smoothly to the big bright sea. The turf was hemmed with an edge of scarlet geranium and coleus, and cast-iron vases painted in chocolate color, standing at intervals along the winding path that led to the sea, looped their garlands of petunia and ivy geranium above the neatly raked gravel.

3.p.235: it would be easy to lie to you; but the truth is I think it detestable

4.p.262:if marrage was a dull duty, as long as it kept the dignity of a duty; lapsing form that, it became a mere battle of ugly appetites. Looking about him, he honored his own past, and mourned for it. After all, there was good in the old ways.

Conclusion:

1.A dive into Scorseses masterpiece about artifice and nostalgia. (Spoilers for The Age of Innocence and La La Land. I have a point, I promise.(r.4)

2. Motivated and unmotivated perspectives.

3. The imperial power of European countries has gradually collapsed after wars and revolutions. In the past, the nobility of the feudal era was deteriorating and their status was replaced by the bourgeoisie who became rich in commerce. But when the bourgeoisie became rich, they yearned for the cultural status of the feudal aristocracy in the past, inherited their tastes and norms, and reversed the status of the original common people and aristocracy, and then replaced them. The upper class in the 1850s was the last noble generation of mankind. Since the rise of capitalism

4.Due to the rise of modern industry, the status of the upper class and the lower class is no longer strong and can gradually move. Various cultural entertainments have also begun to spread with the help of industrialization. The literacy rate of the general public has increased, their purchasing power has increased, and they have access to entertainment that only aristocrats could enjoy in the past, such as reading, sports or fashion entertainment. This trend was fully developed in the 20th century, and the aristocratic group gradually stepped into history.(r.5)

5. A woman naturally sensitive and aloof would be drawn into a tie inexcusable by conventional standards from the force of circumstances, from sheer defenselessness and loneliness.

6. Newland Archer’s life is ruled by society, Ellen’s is ruled by herself. The charm is capsized their destiny upside down. Newland decided to turn away from her first glimps of real life. And surrendered to the society.

7. True love comes from giving, not taking.

8. love:“L”isten（傾聽），“O”bligate（感恩），“V”alued（尊重），“E”xcuse（寬恕）。

9. When we take revenge against another, we lose some of our innocence. -Patrice Redd Vecchione

10. Weve let the blade of our innocence dull over time, and its only in innocence that you find any kind of magic, any kind of courage. -Sean Penn

11. Its innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesnt. -Mignon McLaughlin

12. The consciousness of innocence is an excellent anchor, no doubt. -Albert Payson Terhune

13. “When one loves, one does not calculate.”– Saint Thérèse of Lisieux

14.”Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice but for those who love, time is eternity-Henry Van Dyke.
15.May strive her loves in a sly and selfish way. Ellen’s love soothe all the wound away.

16.True love will dust away our slouched soul. Fake love will ignite our abhorrence of hypocrites with our first glimps.
17. May saw all the appearance, Ellen saw what under the appearcance.

Age of Innocence Summary (for Members who DIDN’T or HAVEN’T completed he book.) by Torey

January 2021

It is a January evening in 1870s New York City and the fashionable are attending the opera. As young Newland Archer, lawyer and man about town, gazes up at his soon-to-be fiancée, May Welland, in the Mingott-family opera box, he is disconcerted by the arrival of May’s cousin, the Countess Ellen Olenska, who has left her wealthy Polish husband. To discourage gossip, Newland decides to announce his and May’s engagement at the Beaufort’s ball that night. All of old New York is at the ball, gossiping about the Countess. Later, when the family plans a dinner to introduce her to society, no one accepts. Without delay, the Mingott family enlists the help of ancient social sages, Henry and Louisa van der Luyden, to shore up support by inviting old New York to a dinner it cannot refuse. In this way they introduce the exotic Countess, and she finds New York society charmingly narrow and provincial compared to Paris. The next day Newland visits the Countess’s small house in a Bohemian section of town. He finds her drawing room exotic and her friendship with shady financier Julius Beaufort unsettling. But he senses her loneliness and, despite some misgivings, sends her yellow roses. The Mingotts enlist Newland’s boss, Mr. Letterblair, to ask Newland to dissuade the Countess from seeking a divorce. When Newland speaks with Ellen—a passionate and exotic woman, unlike his quiet, innocent May—he finds himself falling in love with her, despite his engagement. Worried by temptation, Newland flees to Florida where May’s family is vacationing and asks May to move the wedding date up. Startled, May tells him that if there is “someone else,” he may have his freedom. Touched by her selflessness, Newland returns to New York. As he confesses his love to Ellen, a telegram arrives from May, saying that they can be married in a month. Newland knows his duty.

Book II

The Age of Innocence begins with May marrying Newland as New York society watches. By August, a year later, Newland and May have settled into a fashionable if boring life in New York, living in a wealthy part of town and spending summers with the rest of the rich in Newport. Ellen has moved to Washington D.C.; she returns to stay with her grandmother briefly, but later leaves to visit Boston. Still under her spell, Newland lies to his wife and follows Ellen there.

Ellen promises to stay in America only if they do not hurt May with a clandestine affair. She returns to Washington. Meanwhile, Julius Beaufort’s shady financial dealings catch up with him, and his wife, Regina, appeals to Ellen’s grandmother for help. Mrs. Mingott suffers a stroke and sends for Ellen to nurse her; during the two-hour carriage ride with Ellen from the train station, Newland suggests they have an affair. Ellen refuses, knowing that will hurt May. He abruptly leaves the carriage and walks home. Seeing May in the library, he realizes he will dutifully stay married to her forever.

Undaunted, the next day Newland meets Ellen at the Metropolitan Museum, where she finally agrees to a future one-time affair. Elated but guilty, Newland decides to confess all to May, but she interrupts to tell him that Ellen is leaving for Europe and the Archers will give a farewell dinner for her. Shocked, Newland intends to later follow Ellen. At the dinner, however, he suddenly realizes that the entire family, including May, thinks that he and Ellen are already having an affair; giving Ellen the funds to live in Europe is the family’s way of dealing with the situation. That night as he and May retire, she announces that she thought she was pregnant and told Ellen earlier, before she was really sure. But now she is sure, sealing Newland’s fate forever.

The years pass. Newland is 57 and he and May have two grown children: Dallas and Mary. May has recently died of pneumonia, nursing a third child to health. Newland accompanies Dallas to Paris on a business trip, where Dallas tells Newland the Countess Ellen Olenska has invited them to dine. Newland has not seen her in 26 years. Dallas confides to his father May’s deathbed confession that Newland sacrificed the one thing he loved because of duty and honor. That evening outside the Countess’s apartment, Newland encourages Dallas to go up without him. In Newland’s memory, their love stays forever young,

perfect and unchanging over time.

Questions for Discussion of January Book Club

1.Edith Wharton’s original title for The Age of Innocence was “Old New York.” Which title do you think is more fitting? Why?

“the old New York way of taking life without the effusion of blood” (r.12) “the women described with “innocent” are Mrs. Archer, May and Mr. Welland, all characters that the reader sees are calculating and may only appear innocent”(r.14)

2.The novel is told entirely from Newland Archer’s point of view by an unnamed omniscient narrator. How does this shape the reader’s understanding of May Welland and Ellen Olenska?

Wharton shows the readers that this society is “self-deluded” and “hypocritical”(r.13)

3.At the beginning of Chapter 6, Newland suddenly realizes that marriage is “not the safe anchorage he had been taught to think, but a voyage on uncharted seas.” What does he mean?

A stunning approach to The Age of Innocence. Yes, the art of love and war — this explains why May is a good archer and why her husband is named Archer; why old Mrs. Mingott’s eyes are sharp as pen-knives. Genteel societies have their own weapons; even the most innocent-sounding conversations are strategic. And the peace that prevails is the outcome is these strategies: a compromise, a truce, a treaty. (r.14)

4.Flowers are important symbols throughout The Age of Innocence. Discuss how Wharton uses them. For example, every morning during his engagement, Newland sends lilies-of-the-valley to May. Compare them to the bouquet of yellow roses that he sends to Ellen after he first visits her home. What do these flowers symbolize?

The Lily of the Valley

Newland chooses the lily of the valley, a delicate white flower representing purity, to send his bride-to-be, May.

In one scene Wharton writes, She dropped her eyes to the immense bouquet of lilies-of-the-valley on her knee, as Newland Archer saw her white-gloved fingertips touch the flower softly. He drew a breath of satisfied vanity and his eyes returned to the stage. These symbolic flowers remind the reader of Mays innocence and purity, and Wharton

The Yellow Rose

In contrast, Newlands secret love, Countess Ellen Olenska, receives his gift of yellow roses. In the florists store Newland:

...glanced about the embowered shop, and his eye lit on a cluster of yellow roses. He had never seen any as sun-golden before, and his first impulse was to send them to May instead of the lilies. But they did not look like her--there was something too rich, too strong, in their fiery beauty.

The yellow roses symbolism doesnt match his relationship with May. Roses connote passion, and the color yellow has symbolic connections with jealousy and infidelity. Not only is Newland jealous of Olenskas other suitors, he wants to pursue an extramarital affair with her. The contrast between bright yellow roses and the delicate purity of the lily of the valley perfectly encapsulates the differences between Newlands feelings about May Welland and Ellen Olenska.(r.15)

5.Compare and contrast Newland to other men in old New York, as presented in the novel, particularly Julius Beaufort. How does Newland view himself compared to these men?

The protagonist, Newland Archer, is portrayed as a coward.

6.It may be easy to forget that Ellen is not especially beautiful. Why are men like Newland and Julius so drawn to her?

Ellen was educated and raised in Europe. There, she married a Polish count, who cheated on her and prompted her to leave him(r.18).Archer is drawn to Ellen because she is so different and nothing like what society tells him he should want. He notes that a successful man could have no better social ornament.(r.17)

7.In contrast to her artistic European cousin, May Welland is an accomplished athlete. What does her skill in archery reveal about her character? How else does she differ from Ellen? In what ways are they similar?

Archer: “when i nock my arrow, i unlock my soul””Some say:live , laugh, love, but I say: raise, aim , shoot” (r.20)May will gain what belongs to her without any sympathy.

May Welland

The dewy-eyed and artless young thing who marries Archer. May appears to be unassailably innocent. Over time, Archer comes to see her as the living embodiment of New York society: incapable of thinking on her own, conditioned to act as she is expected. Despite her apparent innocence, May is not as naïve as Newland thinks. However, she remains a loyal wife even after she suspects that Newland is having an affair with Countess Olenska.

Countess Ellen Olenska

Mays cousin and Mrs. Manson Mingotts granddaughter. Ellen was educated and raised in Europe. There, she married a Polish count, who cheated on her and prompted her to leave him. Upon her return to New York family, she hopes to be reintegrated to American life, but she finds only judgmentality and stifling mores. Her behavior is deemed too unorthodox for her to fit in to Old New York. To Archer, however, she is free and truly alive, her own person.(r.19)

8. What is revealed about Ellen’s life in Europe? What is concealed? What kind of cruelty did Ellen endure as the wife of Count Olenski? What kind of cruelty does she experience in America?

Ellen, the Countess Olenska, fulfills Newlands longing for an emotional fantasy life. Her words, her unconventional taste in clothing and interior decorating, and her attitudes symbolize the exotic to traditional Newland. She causes him to question his narrow existence and brings out his protective instincts. Where May is ice, Ellen is fire. Ellens élan and style would be at home in Europe, but seem unduly passionate and unorthodox in New York City.

Emotionally, she is the opposite of May Welland Archer. She shows compassion to Regina Beaufort, a fellow victim of social censure. Often she causes Newland to question why everyone must be and act exactly alike. Her tolerance for the mavericks of society reveals her benevolence, a trait unappreciated by New Yorkers. This makes it possible for May to use Ellens softness to her advantage because she knows that Ellen will never run away with Newland when May reveals her possible pregnancy. Ellens lack of concern for social rules and etiquette make her a target of malicious tongues, but a heroine of the dispossessed. Unlike the inane society wives, she has a mind of her own and uses it well and with concern for others. Unfortunately, this seals her fate because New York society has a difficult time understanding single women living apart from their husbands, and her lifestyle makes her family, as well as their social class, nervous.

Ellen falls in love with Newland, but she is a realist. She asks him, "Does no one want to know the truth here?" as she notices the narrow hypocrisy of his social world. Ellen knows that they cannot live a life outside of convention without hurting others. She reminds Newland that social, religious, and class standards must be upheld. A clandestine affair with him means no honor, no principles, and no happiness. As she explains, "I cant love you unless I give you up." Unselfish in doing exactly that, she realizes they are "chained to their destinies" and she leaves because an unconventional life cannot survive in 1870s New York.

The story of her life after her departure is revealed secondhand. The reader is left to consider that she never married again and she lived a single womans life in Paris. She was presumably able to savor the life of art museums, parties long into the night, possible lovers, wine, and exquisite food. This broader, more passionate life would not have been hers in New York. She remains a mystery to Newland to the end, but a symbol of his imagined life of the soul.

(r.21)

Emma:

To sense the stone murmuring in my kidney, water flushed away my stuffy suffering, Florence’s calling wakes me back to the wonderland of reading club and allows me to share my favorite book and movie, the age of innocence, thank you for your listening to all my (r)esources I learned and happy 2021!

Conclusion:

1.Same as LaLa Land, a dive into Scorseses masterpiece about artifice and nostalgia. (r.2)(r.25)

2. Motivated and unmotivated perspectives.(r.4)

5. A woman naturally sensitive and aloof would be drawn into a tie inexcusable by conventional standards from the force of circumstances, from sheer defenselessness and loneliness.

7. True love comes from giving, not taking.

8. love:“L”isten，“O”bligate，“V”alued，“E”xcuse。

9. When we take revenge against another, we lose some of our innocence. -Patrice Redd Vecchione

10. Weve let the blade of our innocence dull over time, and its only in innocence that you find any kind of magic, any kind of courage. -Sean Penn

11. Its innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesnt. -Mignon McLaughlin

12. The consciousness of innocence is an excellent anchor, no doubt. -Albert Payson Terhune

13. “When one loves, one does not calculate.”– Saint Thérèse of Lisieux

16.True love will dust away our slouched soul. Fake love will ignite our abhorrence of hypocrites with our first glimpse.
17. May saw all the appearance, Ellen saw what under the appearance.

Book Club Meeting January 2021

Book Title: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton.

Firstly, happy new year to all the members. The January meeting was small but lively and if it is a sign of the remaining year, the Book Club will be an interesting and invigorating place for discussion. By the time Edith Wharton wrote The Age of Innocence, she had seen World War I destroy much of the world as she knew it. She looked back on her early years in New York when she herself was a beautiful heiress, as a time of social continuity, and felt that the passing of values from parent to child had a civilizing influence. However as Carol and Lydia pointed out, she also saw the hypocrisy and cruelty practiced by individuals who wore the veneer of respectability. Both of these ideas are seen throughout The Age of Innocence, making it a timeless novel of both the

Gilded Age and of social change.

We discussed the idea that women are “innocent” and not expected to have affairs OR acknowledge those of their husbands, or ever divorce. The only power they have is the power that May uses: duty, loyalty, and (most of all) pregnancy. Perhaps the saddest part of the novel that we discussed was the idea that women are what men say they are. This led into a lively debate about the idea of marriage being between equals and what that looks like. We went back and forth about marriages where the bride and bridegroom are both equals. We like to think that this is the case today, but it rarely is. We all agreed it is changing but not as much as we think. Perhaps some of our members have those marriages but they aren’t as common as we hope. Overall the members agreed that while it may have “seemed” like an age of innocence, hypocrisy was everywhere. It is important to remember that MingLi stays up until the early hours of the morning and her thoughts and ideas are incredibly valuable as is her dedication to participate.