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# Who Are the Main Characters?
- URL: https://www.rebindclassics.com/the-age-of-innocence-who-are-the-main-characters/
- Published: 2026-01-02T00:01:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-02T18:27:58.000Z
- Description: Gay uses the opera scene, where the audience watches each other instead of Faust, to introduce a Newland who adores May but doesn't think much of her.
- Author: Andrew Wessels
- Tags: Roxane Gay on Edith Wharton's Age of Innocence, #video

Roxane Gay walks you through the first six chapters of Edith Wharton's *The Age of Innocence*, starting at the opera, where the best people of New York sit in their club boxes watching each other rather than *Faust*. Everything here is a performance, she says, and everyone plays their role to perfection. Ellen Olenska arrives as the fly in the ointment; May Welland as the young woman who has always done what was expected of her.

The film's real subject is Newland Archer, and Gay isn't gentle with him. He adores May but doesn't think much of her, and he holds most of the people he cares for in low esteem. Then she turns to chapter five, where he tells Sillerton Jackson he's "sick of the hypocrisy that would bury a woman alive" and that women ought to be as free as men. Part of him means it. Gay leaves you wondering which part will win, and reading these mores with your own century in mind.

## Transcript

Welcome back. These opening chapters introduce us to Newland Archer and his privileged world. We are afforded glimpses of the most influential people of New York society, those who demand conformity to convention and punish anyone who defies it. We also see the early strains of the novel's primary tension: Newland figuring out what kind of man he wants to be and what he wants to make of his life. He believes in meeting social expectations, believes in the necessity of those expectations, but he also resents it, yearns for something different.

We first meet our three protagonists taking in the opera *Faust*. All of the best people are in attendance in their sumptuous club boxes. And though a beautiful opera is being performed on stage, the members of this tight-knit wealthy society are observing each other rather than the opera. This juxtaposition really sets the tone. It reminds us that in these people's lives, everything is a performance. Everyone has a role to play and they must play it to perfection.

When Countess Ellen Olenska comes to New York, she is the proverbial fly in the ointment. She's someone, we learn, who has often defied convention in one way or another, most recently by taking up with a European count and then daring to leave a terrible marriage. What a scandal.

And then there is May Welland, a young woman who has always done what was expected of her. She is intelligent, but not overly so, lithe and athletic, demure and devoted. Because we primarily see her through Newland's eyes, it would be easy to assume there is nothing more to May than meets the eye. In the blush of young love, Newland idealizes May. He adores her, but doesn't seem to think much of her. He assumes he knows her completely and also believes he is the one to bestow upon May her most important opinions.

Newland and May are deeply invested in keeping up appearances. So when Countess Ellen Olenska comes to town, they have to navigate a real dilemma. She is family, of a good family, so they have to maintain the facade that they will welcome her home with open arms, because that is what is done for family. They also must navigate the complex unspoken rules by which they live. Newland loves his fiancée, but doesn't want to lose the esteem of his peers, and May loves her cousin, but doesn't want to lose the esteem of her peers. Each in their own way try to find ways for Ellen to be welcomed home more amicably. Newland, for his part, is not thrilled that he has been put in this position. Why is that, do you think?

And still, despite this bit of intrigue, much of these early chapters are a tightly focused character study of Newland. Every time I read this novel, I'm struck by how confident he is in his understanding of the world, his place in it, and how he presents himself to the upper echelons of New York society. I am startled by some of his uncharitable insights about the people around him and how he seems to hold so many of the people he cares for the most in such low esteem. Newland is bemused by most of the people in his life, if not condescending. He is, in his own mind, the benevolent master of his domain.

And yet there are also interesting moments when we see that Newland has the capacity for larger and progressive thought. In chapter five, when Newland is talking with his friend Sillerton Jackson about Ellen Olenska, Newland clearly chafes at the chilly reception his cousin-to-be is receiving, when he says, "I'm sick of the hypocrisy that would bury a woman alive if her husband prefers to live with harlots." He goes on to say, "Women ought to be free, as free as we are." And even though some of his actions contradict that sentiment, we know part of him believes it and recognizes the impossible burdens placed on women of the age. There is, we hope, more to Newland than meets the eye too.

When reading historical fiction, we are confronted by the past with contemporary sensibilities. What stands out most to you about the social mores of *The Age of Innocence*? Keep these contrasts between then and now in mind as we read further into this novel. So much of what was acceptable during the Gilded Age shapes the events of this story.