Progress Book 8 of 100
This book is about the strict rules and standards of New
York Society in the late 1800’s. The
novel follows the life of Newland Archer as he becomes engaged to May Welland. The moment they are engaged, May’s cousin
Countess Ellen Olenska arrives in New York after leaving her husband in Europe. Society in those days did not tolerate
divorce or scandal, so Ellen quickly becomes the black sheep of the
family. Newland is a strict believer of
following the strict rules of society and quickly judges May as someone
bad. Everything changes when they meet,
he starts to fall in love with her and appreciates her thoughts and knowledge,
quickly comparing her with his fiancé May and often puts May’s character down. He sees nothing that grand in May and still
marries her, all the while pining for Ellen.
This is the whole story.
The style of Edith Wharton didn’t make this book a quick
read, despite the fact that it’s only 235 pages. Often times Ms. Wharton would set up a scene
and then the next chapter would be a whole new scene/setting. I guess this
was done to give readers a chance to image what they want to. The book spans a few years time, and then
jumps 26 years to the conclusion. Newland’s
torment and agony of not being with Ellen and then being with Ellen (almos) was
not that interesting to me. I didn’t
like his character and didn’t enjoy the book very much. I guess you are suppose to sympathize with
May, and I did, but even though she was shown to be cleverer than Newland
thought, it was just too much that she had to hide it and be the perfect wife
and perfect front. If Ms. Wharton was
trying to explain how rigid society was, she did a good job- since I didn’t
feel that close to any of the characters and didn’t mind to see how they ended
up.
I give this an 82%, B-
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