|
The House of Mirth (平装)
by Edith Wharton
| Category:
Fiction |
| Market price: ¥ 78.00
MSL price:
¥ 68.00
[ Shop incentives ]
|
| Stock:
Pre-order item, lead time 3-7 weeks upon payment [ COD term does not apply to pre-order items ] |
MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
Vividly capturing society and human nature, Wharton stuns readers with a beautifully told story that has amounted to the status of a classic. |
| If you want us to help you with the right titles you're looking for, or to make reading recommendations based on your needs, please contact our consultants. |
|
| |
AllReviews |
1 2   | Total 2 pages 11 items |
|
|
Caren Town (500 Great Books by Women) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
The most compelling aspect of The House of Mirth is watching Lily Bart descend the social ladder, changing from an alluring, fashionable decoration at lavish country estates to a wild-eyed, dishevelled woman living in a shabby hotel, addicted to tea and sleeping drops. The most frightening aspect of the book is that the progress seems somehow both inevitable and avoidable at nearly every turn. Here is a physically beautiful and psychologically complex woman who has become or been made into an object for consumption by a society that values the material world exclusively. As Lily approaches thirty, still unmarried, and without financial resources, her value - in this society - declines. Part of the responsibility for her fate can be placed on her lack of a maternal influence, on her own irresolution, on the weakness of her primary suitor, on the viciousness of the other rich women in the novel, but the ultimate blame has to fall on a society that made her "so evidently the victim of the civilization that produced her, that the links of her bracelet seemed like manacles chaining her to her fate." Nearly a century after its publication, this novel is chillingly accurate in its remorseless critique of a society willing to sacrifice any and all who do not conform to its expectations. |
|
|
Gore Vidal (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
There are only three or four American novelists who can be thought of as "major," and Edith Wharton is one. |
|
|
The New York Times (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
A tragedy of our modern life, in which the relentlessness of what men used to call Fate and esteem, in their ignorance, a power beyond their control, is as vividly set forth as ever it was by Aeschylus or Shakespeare. |
|
|
Louis Auchincloss (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
Uniquely authentic among American novels of manners. |
|
|
Mary Whipple (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
Published in 1905, The House of Mirth offers a blistering social commentary on the lifestyles and behavior of super-rich society. Having grown up in this society, Wharton evaluates it here as an insider, and her trenchant observations give this early novel a liveliness and verisimilitude not characteristic of "aristocratic" novels written by outsiders. Set at a time in which the old, moneyed aristocracy was being forced to admit newcomers who had made their recent fortunes through industry, the novel shows moneyed society in flux, the old guard ensuring their exclusivity against parvenus who are not the "right type," at the same time that their sons and daughters were often securing large fortunes through marriage into some of these new families.
Lily Bart, a beautiful young woman of good family whose father lost everything when she was only nineteen, is left dependent on wealthy relatives in this society until she can charm a financially secure suitor into marriage. At age twenty-nine, she is no longer a debutante, and the pressure is mounting for her to marry, though she lacks the unlimited financial resources of social rivals. Still, her wit and charm make her a delightful companion, and she is never at a loss for suitors. Intelligent enough to want a real marriage and not just a merger between families, she has resisted making a commitment to date, though the clock is ticking.
As Lily tries to negotiate a good marriage and future for herself, she is aware that the competition is fierce. Women "friends" pounce on the latest gossip and spread rumors to discredit rivals, and Lily's reputation is tainted with hints of impropriety. Her opportunities for a good marriage begin to dwindle, and when her aunt, Mrs. Peniston, dies and leaves her a bequest that covers only her debts, Lily is no longer able to compete in the society so attractive to her and begins her downward spiral.
Wharton creates a complete picture of turn-of-the-century New York society and its "important" people - their lack of scruples, their opportunism, their manipulations, and their smug self-importance, characteristics one may also see in Lily when she is part of this society, though there is a limit on how far she will stoop. But Wharton also shows how quickly a woman may become an outcast when the money runs out and she is thrown on her own resources without any training for any other kind of life. A well-developed melodrama filled with revealing details, this novel established Wharton's reputation as a novelist/commentator on the manners and morals of high society and those who would participate in it. |
|
|
Robert Newman (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
Though The Age of Innocence may be more famous, with a well-known film to spread its story, I felt that this novel was better. Wharton provides the reader with a well-woven tapestry of despair and tragedy. I felt myself wishing that Lily would take the initiative, do something to stop her slow decline into poverty and drugs, but at the same time, as an amateur literary critic, knowing that in her inability to do so lay the whole point of the book. The description was wonderful, the subsidiary characters excellently drawn, and the ending powerful. I did not particularly appreciate the stereotyping of the Jewish character, but no doubt that expressed the feelings of upper class New York at the time, and so I reluctantly accepted it in my heart. Nothing, especially retrospective viewing of ethnocentrism, can take away from Edith Wharton's rank as one of the great American writers. |
|
|
Martin Aisner (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
The world that Edith Wharton felt comfortable with was the one that was located in the fashionably expensive upper east side of New York City of the mid 1870s. There were plenty of newly rich businessmen who had made fortunes after the Civil War, and the attitudes of "hit `em hard" that made money then worked pretty well later too. Such attitudes were often grounded in a smugness that said, "I got mine, and you didn't." In The House of Mirth, Wharton examines several figures whose lives intersect at a junction that separates those who have money from those who don't. The losers in such a confrontation are not only the ones who wind up broke - they are simply the most obvious - but the so called winners are also losers in that Wharton shows them as losing their humanity even if they maintain their fortunes.
Lily Bart is a very pretty but poor young woman who likes to wear nice clothes and travel in high class society. Since she is poor, she has no choice but to marry into money, and so she spends most of the novel looking at one man and then another, before deciding which man has enough money to guarantee her entrance into the world of which she can only dream. When Lily sees her upper class companions, she does not see them as three-dimensional fully-fleshed individuals, for if she did, she would notice that under the fancy clothes and expensive jewelry are people with the same weaknesses of character as anyone else. For their part, when Lily's rich friends see her, they either recognize her for what she is as a girl on the make or they try to help her gain entrance into their world of money and privilege. The problem with Lily is that she is simply not ruthless enough to get what she says she wants. On one hand she has been taught from childhood that the only way for a poor but pretty girl like her to get money is to marry it. On the other, however, when she does have the chance to marry into money, her "good" side stops her from taking advantage of a wealthy man who sees only a fine looking lady like Lily. Such a rich man is Mr. Rosedale, who may not be the handsomest man in the world or the most classy of individuals, but he does ask for her hand, which Lily refuses since she thinks she can do better. In the world of fiction, or perhaps in the real world as well, such a refusal often leads to a later regret that a golden opportunity was missed. And indeed, when Lily's standing in the rich community takes a tumble, so does her reputation, and when Lily looks up Mr. Rosedale to tell him that she has reconsidered his offer, he tells her to take a hike. Lily's fall from grace reads like a soap opera. She alienates the one true if poor man who would have been happy to marry her. She allows a rich man to try to seduce her in the most caddish of ways. And she gets involved in a life style that costs considerable sums to maintain, the result of which is to bankrupt her. She takes a dead end job in a factory, and on top of all that she is being blackmailed by that cad seducer. For her, there is no way out but suicide.
The House of Mirth is not quite the drama of naturalism that some see it as. In the world of brute naturalism, the world conspires to crush you without mercy or hope. But in Lily's case, there are others who are good and are not crushed, her would be lover Selden, for example, is hurt by her death but otherwise uninjured. In Lily's demise, Edith Wharton recreates a world that entices one to play a deadly game, the rules of which are stacked against the player from the start. The House of Mirth can still be seen as a cautionary tale against playing that most deadly of games. |
|
|
Jennifer (MSL quote), UK
<2007-01-10 00:00>
I was totally overwhelmed by The House of Mirth. Although it was clear that Lily's short sightedness was responsible for her downfall, I find it difficult to pin point exactly why the character evoked such strong feelings of sympathy from me. Her beauty makes her captivating, and she is so naieve and inexperienced, that you cannot help but feel so much sadness when things take an inevitable turn for the worse. The ending was incredibly emotional, and so moving, illustrating the point that, at the end of the day, beauty will not secure success or fulfillment. I cannot reccomend this book highly enough - it is beautifully written with a complex yet incredibly loveable female protagonist. In my opinion, this book is underrated. It is certainly worthy of the title "Modern Classic." |
|
|
Yuval Taylor (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
Is victory in our culture reserved solely for small personal matters? Is its price always too high? Is its value negligible? This book, written in 1905, continually turns the smallest victories into major defeats. The House of Mirth is named after a passage in Ecclesiastes: "The heart of the wise is in the house of morning; but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth." I couldn't agree less. It galled me that this breathtakingly subtle book should end with what seems to me like a hammer blow to the human spirit. Well, only if one allows oneself an emotional response. If not, the novel ends with a literary parlor game. What is "the word which made all clear"? Cowardice? Money? Honor? Death? Defeat? Certainly not love - that makes nothing clear. I was able to find only four things about The House of Mirth that would tell me it was not written by Henry James. Its range, which seems broader than anything James would attempt in a single work. Its linearity, its unbroken declining trajectory. Is anything James wrote so utterly tragic? So unrelentingly anti-capitalist? Strange that such a dour tale should be such a joy - so enchanting - to read. |
|
|
L. Dann (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
Wharton's darker view of out-of-step women in very different social circumstances is depicted in Ethan Frome and this famous novel, The House of Mirth. Lurking in the gilded world of Lilly Bart are many twists and turns that torment the incautious souls. Like her counterpart, Mattie in E.F., Lilly is lulled by the power of her own beauty and flames a rebelliousness that ignites a spark to fast-drying opportunities. Though she waivers between eligible men who guaranteed lifelong protection, her passive resistance to the iron-clad social constraints, her failure to respect the rules, placed her at odds with the fates.
The world retaliates against rebellious people. Lilly, unfortunately, had not that iron shield of deep resolve or strength of ideals, to bolster her in her ambivalence. This novel has many of the same elegant settings, grand estates and social affairs of Wharton's other works. In this story however, they exist like the dark sky, site of her falling star. Breathless, classic and mythic. |
|
|
|
1 2 | Total 2 pages 11 items |
|
|
|
|
|
|
