Roxane Gay on Edith Wharton's Age of Innocence
"People are attached to the idea of individualism without wanting to pay the price of individualism."
Innocence Came Later
Wharton's title came from a painting really called A Little Girl. Gay reads a Gilded Age that was never innocent, and lands it squarely in the present.
Read the introduction →- 1 On the Surface, a Love Story Episode 1 • 15 min • Members
- 2 The Scarlet D Episode 2 • 16 min • Members
- 3 Yellow Roses Episode 3 • 16 min • Members
- 4 The Company Man Episode 4 • 14 min • Members
- 5 The Nepo Baby of Old New York Episode 5 • 15 min • Members
- 6 The Performance of Being Newland Archer Episode 6 • 18 min • Members
- 7 Each Time You Happen to Me Episode 7 • 19 min • Members
- 8 Save Your Pity Episode 8 • 21 min • Members
In Conversation With – Where this book meets another
The Scarlet D
Boston sewed Hester's A in cloth; New York pinned Ellen's D in whispers. Marshall and Gay show which mark a woman can work, and it isn't the polite one.
Go deeper →The Price of Knowing: James, Wharton, and the Women Who See Everything
Maggie Verver and May Welland are the real intelligences of their novels. Greenwell and Gay part on what each does with knowledge: reconstruction or control.
Go deeper →The One Who Learns and the One Who Doesn't
Elizabeth Bennet learns herself in time to change; Newland Archer learns too late to matter. Gay and Stein trace the same flaw to opposite ends.
Go deeper →Marriage as Transaction: The Two Ways a Novel of Manners Ends
Austen and Wharton diagnose the same marriage economy, Gay and Stein show; one lets Elizabeth beat the house, the other closes the door on Ellen.
Go deeper →
The Questions these books keep starting →
The Cage, Not the Romance: Roxane Gay on The Age of Innocence
Gay argues The Age of Innocence is about the cage, not the romance: a status system everyone obeys because freedom costs more than anyone will pay.
Go deeper →Why Ellen Olenska Is Punished for Her Integrity
What if Ellen Olenska is exiled not for her divorce, but for her integrity?
Go deeper →Is Newland Archer a Hero or a Coward?
Neither hero nor coward, Roxane Gay rules: Newland Archer's love for Ellen was 'a mental vacation' — a rebellion he never intended to act on, and never did.
Go deeper →- Was Charlotte Lucas Right to Marry Mr. Collins? Sadie Stein on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice
- What Does the A on Hester's Chest Actually Mean? Megan Marshall on Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter
- Was Thoreau Selfish? The Question of Self-Reliance John Kaag on Henry David Thoreau's Walden
- What Is Kant's Categorical Imperative? Paul Guyer on Immanuel Kant