Auteur's library

Edith Wharton

The Age of Innocence

1920

Ambiguity, nuance, maturity and a lot of honesty are what you learn through reading this one. By the end of the book, you're still wondering where the author stands in her work. And that's exactly where she gets her power from. You have to choose, you have to reflect on the characters, on why they can be so revolting and understandable at the same time; basically this is a reflection on your own self. These are the kind of people you'd never want to meet in real life, except to point at from your own corner and criticize. Suddenly, they are filling the room, they are filling your brain and you've got to take their own thoughts into account. How disturbingly good...If only for that, this is a literary masterpiece.

Tags: 19th-century society, roman de mœurs, ladies and gents' courtship dance, close quarters, our social world vs. our human quest, New York's social structure and relation to the Old World, study of femininity