The House of Mirth Summary
Edith Wharton

The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton Born in New York in 1862 to elderly parents, Edith Wharton was raised in a family replete with socially prominent relatives. Wharton traveled abroad and married ... Read more

Biography EssayWhile at the close of her career Edith Wharton was sometimes regarded as passe, a literary aristocrat whose fiction about people of high social standing had little to tell about the mas... Read more

During the early decades of the twentieth century--at a time when New York City could ban women from smoking in public--one American woman published works which discussed love outside of marriage, sca... Read more

Perhaps the most striking thing about Edith Wharton 's reputation as a novelist is the fact that she has been "reclaimed" so many times. This fact seems all the more remarkable when one reflects that... Read more

Although Edith Wharton is better known as a novelist than a short-story writer, she was in fact writing and publishing stories well before her debut as a novelist in 1902. Her first published story ... Read more

In the following review, Meynell finds Wharton's moral stance lacking in The House of Mirth. Mrs. Wharton is essentially a moralist, albeit with the whole modern resolve not to declare herself.... Read more

In the following essay, Orr discusses the world of The House of Mirth as a contractual milieu. “But you belittle me, don't you, … in being so sure.” —Lily Bart1 &#x... Read more

In the following essay, Sapora examines the conflict in The House of Mirth between the image of women as works of art or decorative objects and women's attempts at self-actualization. At Mrs. W... Read more

In the following essay, Clubbe draws upon Wharton's interest in interior design to discuss her correlation in The House of Mirth between Lily's interior physical environments and the str... Read more

In the following essay, Waid traces the publication history of The House of Mirth from its origin as a serial in Scribner's magazine. In 1902, after reading The Valley of Decision, Edith Wharto... Read more

In the following essay, Moddelmog examines Wharton's narrative strategy of demonstrating the difficulties inherent in portraying female subjectivity by distancing herself, her other characters,... Read more

In the following essay, Totten suggests that Lily's one genuine moment of subjectivity happens when she constructs herself as the aesthetic figure of Mrs. Lloyd. “If, then, design is ine... Read more

In the following essay, Davidson discusses the options for women, particularly of Lily's class, in early-twentieth-century American society. Edith Wharton, while writing her first major novel, ... Read more

In the following essay, Showalter discusses the “crisis of adulthood” faced by Lily Bart and the nonfictional women upon which her character is based, who had to conform to the social ex... Read more

In the following essay, Dixon discusses how Wharton's use of “contrasting angles of vision” as a literary technique reflects her ideological perspective concerning the role of the... Read more

In the following essay, Ammentorp finds that Wharton's male characters in The House of Mirth suffer nearly as much as the women because of their society's expectations. In the past decad... Read more

The House of Mirth is a story that is full of deception, betrayal, deceit, and trickery. It exploits the social hierarchy of New York City in the late 19th century. Edith Wharton writes a magnificent ... Read more