This was a rough read - hard to stumble through. full review to follow ( )

Here's what I wrote in 2016 about this read: "Memorable for its story about NYC society; it's rules, its draw, its ability to exclude and desecrate. And yet the heroine was raised exactly for this and could not survive any other way." Quotations in the comments section are my exact kindle highlights ( )

Actually couldn't finish. Gave up after 53 pages. Just couldn't bring myself to care about pampered people that don't work for a living. ( )

I feel like this is a book I couldn't have enjoyed as much in my teens or twenties (unlike Tess of the D'urbervilles, which I read in my teens and loved for its lurid romanticism). The story of Lily Bart resonates better in my 30s, and I appreciated the tarnished view of society life much more after years of reading Regency and Victorian romances where everything works out in the end. Lily was a character I could really feel for; if I'd been in her position, I'd like to think that I would have made different (better) choices, but I suspect that I wouldn't--and that's where the appeal lies. We like to think we can see our choices in black and white, but emotion adds so many shades of grey that we can find ourselves making worse and worse choices with the best of intentions. ( )

Maybe 3.5 stars? I’m conflicted because I really wanted to like this book. It took me two years to read this, I would pick it up, put it down, and then start all over again. Finally, I told myself to just finish it and I did like the second half of the book! The Age of Innocence is in my top 3 books, and I really wanted this to be as good as that. ( )

Different cover picture

I don’t know what it is I find difficult about Wharton, but I tend to find her writing style a bit too careful and formulaic, and at times the elegance of her highbred American characters can be irksome. ( )

I've never read a story where the protagonist was so self-centered and shallow yet so likable. And I've never read a story where money and partying meant so much to the protagonist, aspirations that are so foreign to myself, yet I still felt sympathy for her, and her misfortunes felt so real and callous.

This might be described as a story about New York, high society, partying, traveling, love, scandals, ambition, or money. But most of all this is a story ultimately about Miss Lily Bart's loneliness, and it succeeds in portraying this loneliness so well that I have to recommend it wholeheartedly. ( )

A woman in Lily Bart's world had only two options: marriage or death.

Lily was special -- primed to marry well, to be "decorative" and "ornamental," particularly for her exquisite beauty, and conditioned to avoid a "dingy" life. Except, Lily struggled to make decisions and had missed a few earlier opportunities to marry well. Now she was closer to being beyond marriageable age.

Unfortunately, Lily had expensive taste and was obsessed with money; and she was poor, sustained only by the pity of a wealthy aunt. She complained that men had a choice to marry or remain single, but women did not. If women were to appear successful and rich, they must marry into "partnership" with a successful man. Therefore, Lily was holding out for that unique man who was successful, well-off, and could also bring her happiness. But who?

Selden was a good friend to Lily, but he was not wealthy, and Lily knew he could never financially satisfy her thirst to keep up with high society. And yet, she considered him the "richest man she had ever met." He was free from the restraints of society.

Regrettably, high society was exhausting because there were so many rules that women had to obey, and many rules were hypocritical. Lily also felt the pressure to gamble because that is what women in her circle were expected to do. Lily's gambling addiction later cost her everything.

Lily frustrated me

Up to this point, Lily had frustrated me. She was malleable, indecisive, and foolish. And while I added up all of the lies she had told to cover her wretched lifestyle or to save herself from mortification, she showed a glimmer of noble character. Lily had received evidence that a married woman in her circle of acquaintances had pursued a romantic affair with Selden through letters. But instead of confronting either party, she kept the information to herself, specifically to protect her good friend; however, it could have been used to blackmail the wicked married woman who intentionally singled out Lily, took advantage of her, and finally, out of jealousy, sabotaged her reputation with rumors and, thus, isolated her from society.

It seemed everyone and everything had turned against Lily. She did not belong to that harsh "other world." Selden saw this clearly. He loved her and wanted to rescue her from it, but he could not help her. She was all alone.
That's Lily all over, you know: she works like a slave preparing the ground and sowing her seed; but the day she ought to be reaping the harvest she oversleeps herself or goes off on a picnic.
One of my own marginal notes stated: Lily would have married a rich prince, but self-sabotage is always her end. I don't think Lily wants to be married after all.

This story was hardly over when Lily's worldly aunt died of humiliation. She was outraged with her niece because of the rumors she had heard about Lily's "folly" and, therefore, decreased her legacy, leaving her in an extremely precarious circumstance. Lily had expected to pay off her debt with the inheritance, but now it could hardly be enough.

Lily was desperate and thought about a prosperous man who once admired and sought to marry her. She had declined because she knew she would have settled. Since circumstances had changed, she reconsidered marriage with him; however, he was no longer interested because her reputation had been tarnished. Yet, he knew about the damaging letters and the affairs of that particular woman who had ruined Lily, and he encouraged Lily to come out with the truth -- repairing her own reputation and "making her marriageable again." But because of her noble courage, she would not drag Selden's name through the mud.

Lily salvages my opinion of herself

By Book Two, Chapter Eight, I wrote: "Lily is a bigger person (even flawed) than all of us." She had declined in society, and yet, she refused to compromise her convictions. Not only was she alone -- she was invisible.
Hitherto her intermittent impulses of resistance had sufficed to maintain her self-respect.
Lily eventually resided at a boarding house and worked as a laborer, until that ended. And like Madame Bovary, she resorted to drugs to help her sleeplessness.

Reynolds: Mrs. Lloyd, 1775-76

Lily learned a lesson too late

In the final pages, Lily learned one simple lesson. She met a young working-girl whom she had once helped. The girl had married now and was a mother, and Lily had the opportunity to witness the "central truth of existence:" this young family was built in poverty, with faith and courage. They did not have the financial security of high society, but they were free to love each other and be happy.

In the end, she remained true to her word, and when her aunt's cheque arrived, she paid off all of her debts. She could have been happy with Selden, but she made her choice. This was the end for Lily. She will never have her life back.

A little soapbox

Though the demise of Lily is tragic, much of it was self-imposed. She complained about what it cost for [her] "to live on the rich":
--it's a privilege we have to pay for! We eat their dinners and drink their wine, and smoke their cigarettes, and use their carriages and their opera-boxes and their private cares -- yes, but there's a tax to pay on every one of those luxuries...the girl pays it by tips and cards too -- oh, yes, I've had to take up bridge again -- and by going to the best dress-makers, and having just the right dress for every occasion, and always keeping herself fresh and exquisite and amusing!
For Lily, her greatest fear was poverty; but it should have been fear of facing an angry God. I know that was not the point of the story, but I see it this way: man's problems are not caused by the discrepancy between rich and poor; man's problems are caused by his disobedience toward God and doing everything his own way. And that is why Lily was lost, indecisive, and obsessed with wealth. All of those people were lost because they lived life their way -- with gossip, adultery, covetousness, self-preservation, greed, materialism, lying, slothfulness, self-worship -- we know our ways are self-destructive; but there is a better way.

Nonetheless...

The House of Mirth is an intriguing and calculating story - never a dull chapter. The characters are believable, even as caricatures of society. And Edith Wharton is an exceptionally mature writer. She knows the human heart thoroughly and, I'm afraid, does not exaggerate or hide any rotten detail at all.

This is my second read of House of Mirth, and on some pages, I ran out of room in the margins to add any new notes.

If you have only considered reading House of Mirth or any other Edith Wharton, what are you waiting for? Do it now. You will not regret it. ( )

My favorite of all her novels. ( )

I was completely surprised by this novel. I expected drudgery like so many other classics I've read lately. This was amazing.

It started out cheery enough, yet I knew it was a tragedy, so I purposely did not attach myself to any characters. As things started unraveling for Lily, I got drawn in to the upcoming spiral of her life. I was even reading along with a friend who finished before me and she said she was very sad by the ending. I laughed at her for being so easily swept up into liking characters we knew would have some tragedy.

As I read the final chapters, I was so impressed with how Edith Wharton could spin a tale, describe thoughts and feelings, and lead us into eventual despair right along with Lily. Her writing made me either nod my head in feeling like she's described some of my own feelings, or pondering how well she's described things I've never felt. And by the end, I felt such sadness, it was a literal pain in my chest. Damn her. I was invested without even realizing it.

So amazing in character development, in getting the reader to understand the plight of Lily, the tough decisions she had to make and just didn't, the way the spins of others had such an effect on her own control of her circumstances, and the tragic end.

Just a very good read. May be in my top 3. ( )

4.5 Stars. First off, a sort of public service announcement for those who are new to classics, I learned the hard way a long time ago that “introductions” in classics are often littered with spoilers as is the case with the Anna Quindlen penned introduction in my copy of this one, so unless you enjoy learning every major plot point ahead of time, do yourself a favor and wait until after you read the story to read the introductions. It would be nice if publishers would ever do the readers a favor and just put these things at the back of the book where they belong.

The House of Mirth moves at a relatively slow pace, dialogue is minimal, it’s definitely more character focused than plot driven, still it rarely felt tedious and does have some page turning moments. Like most classics, it’s probably best to reach for this when you’re in a patient mood, when you feel more like taking your time rather than breezing through something.

Although this was written near the start of the 1800’s, in many ways the world of this story doesn’t feel as foreign or distant as you might imagine, social climbing in New York society back then doesn’t read all that different from someone clamoring for likes and follows, putting on a facade or living above their means in order to present a certain image, and we’re certainly also in an era where one misstep, or even the whisper of a misstep, whether you’re proven truly guilty of it or not can send your life into a tailspin. This is one of those books that while it takes place in a specific time period, it winds up feeling somewhat timeless thanks to how in tune the author is with how human beings tick, everyone in this story is recognizable, a person who could as believably exist now as then.

Initially, it’s tempting to write off Lily Bart as a one-dimensional socialite gold-digger archetype, the sort of person who I avoid watching on reality shows, but the fuller the picture I had of her, the more interesting she became psychologically and by the end I had came around to caring for her, too. If you want to read a female character full of complexities and contradictions, you need to meet Lily Bart, she’s can be appalling yet her moral fiber will surprise you, she’s both naive and conniving, and she’s prone to self-sabotage thanks to the tug of war inside her, torn between the material life she’s been raised to covet and a type of freedom that isn’t really available to the women who lived that lifestyle at that time.

While it was easier to like secondary characters Gerty and Nettie, I suspect Lily Bart is someone who will linger in my mind for a long time, particularly those final scenes with her. ( )

I liked the book a lot but the final chapters really dragged, to the point where I wondered if she got paid by the word. ( )

Wharton, a product of the New York society she so ruthlessly satirizes, takes a few left turns in this novel, none of them really unexpected. Her strength lies in dissecting the social mores of the fin de siecle 1%; the subtleties of the intrigue and the perils to a young single lady like Lily Bart (whose status is dependent on the good will of others) reveal a gilded jungle where only the enormously wealthy are safe.

Unfortunately, as Lily's fortunes decline, "The House of Mirth" descends into melodrama. The introduction by Cynthia Wolff makes clear the poignancy of Wharton's dilemma, for which Lily Bart is a cipher. What use does a beautiful young woman serve, other than decorative? Wharton escapes this trap through her writing; Lily has no such option, mainly because her perspective is so limited. This is the tragedy of the pre-feminist era. ( )

Beautiful, but too many dry spots to say it was page turner. Biggest plus is Lily's character arc, though it seemed to all happen in the last 4 chapters and her unwillingness to part with any information was insufferable. I've never been one for stories theme-ing on fate, but I still found this story tragically enthralling and has a good execution to meditate (or brood) on. Makes you realize we all need someone or something to keep us grounded. ( )

Lily Bart's mother always wanted to be in the eye of society and she lived a life of Glamour. Daily Bart's father worked himself nearly to death and when he went bankrupt, his death followed soon after. "Never mind," said Lily Bart's mother, "with that face you'll get it all back." Lily, much like her mother, didn't know anything but the life of society. She lived off her rich friends, being invited to their country houses, onto their yachts to cruise the Mediterranean, where everything was paid for. Everything that is, except for the expectation of her to gamble at Bridge. That ate into her small allowance dreadfully. She was already 29 years old and she knew she had to get married soon, or face a life of poverty. She had several chances but something always made her blow off those boys. I found myself urging her "don't let this one get away, Lily, come on! you're running out of time." Well Lily did run out of time. A great commentary on the shallow graspingness of the rich and high society, This is also one of the saddest books I've ever read. I almost cried for her. ( )

Wonderful!

Lily Bart is the most genuine character that I have had the pleasure of encountering in a long, long time. She is a product of her world and imprisoned by it. When I started the novel, I had flashbacks to Anna Karenina. Society lures these women into their situations and then condemns them for their inability to survive the gauntlet they are set.

Wharton obviously intimately understands the “old money” society of New York city and all the nuances that exist between those who are securely engrained in the upper echelon and those who are just trying to either remain there or climb to those heights. One cannot help wonder why anyone would want to be a part of such a narrow-minded, snobbish set; but at the same time one understands that having tasted that world a girl would have little idea of how to survive outside it. The dichotomy between what is true and the appearances that are merely kept at the surface make up the substance of the world that Lily must hang on to or perish.

In the midst of all this disingenuousness, Lily tries to keep a hold on her moral compass. While she is expected to marry for money, she can barely make herself fulfill that odious requirement. She has genuine feelings for Seldon and knows he has the same for her, but she is unable to put aside her need for wealth and accept his offered love. She is really and truly trapped by her station in society and therefore at the mercy of catty, unethical, frightened and jealous women, wealthy men who think they should be able to purchase any woman with their wealth, and uncaring relatives who are judgmental and capricious. Only two persons of her acquaintance actually make an effort to know who Lily IS, the rest just see who Lily ought to be or appears to be.

This is a sad and cynical story, but it reads with truth. Lily is a complicated character...not perfect, not saintly, but certainly mistreated and victimized. I loved that Lily accepted her own role in her fall and that, even in her desperation, refused to sink into the immorality of blackmail or trading her body for money. I very much wanted this tale to end differently, while at the same time knowing that it was unlikely Lily could regain her position without compromising her soul.

I remember reading Ethan Frome when I was much younger and not being overly impressed with it. I recently read a book of Wharton’s short stories and felt quite the opposite about them. This novel is remarkable and ranks high on my list of must-read classics. I will certainly read The Age of Innocence now and I am sure I need to revisit Frome, I obviously missed something essential the first time around. ( )

Depressing and sad for any woman to read ( )

https://sravikabodapati.blogspot.com/2022/07/the-house-of-mirth-by-edith-warton.... ( )

⚠️ spoilers

Ahh Lily…what am I to do with you?!lol She is both exasperating and tragic, but I didn’t fully get the “tragic” component the first time I read this book. I reread “The House of Mirth” because I panicked!lol Yepp…I looked at my TBR list and couldn’t figure out what to read, so I grabbed this one at random from my "read" shelves.

The first time I met Lily I just didn’t “get” her and she annoyed the crap out of me, I was too irritated to “think deep” and critically about her character. This time? She still exasperated the crap out of me (😂🙄), but I have sympathy for her and can better understand why she is the way she is.

Lily is not only a product of the high class NY society of the time, but also the trappings and emotional and psychological demands of her mother, who was never satisfied, squandered their wealth, and foisted all of her hopes of “returning” to their proper place on the “marketable” beauty of her daughter (as a hook to catch a wealthy suitor).

Her mother also foisted all of her despondency and dissatisfaction when things did not work out on Lily. What a horrible burden for a child…a young woman…to grow up thinking that all of her worth and value as a human being is tied up on her pretty face. Her mother also did Lily a disservice by raising her to think she was better than others (even the “rich” relatives she came to depend upon), so there is that constant thread of dissatisfaction and superiority in her dealings with others.

Lily needed to secure her financial security through an advantageous marriage and did everything she could to make it happen. She was beautiful and knew this was her “ticket” to secure a wealthy husband. Yet, whether consciously or not, she would self-sabotage at every turn. Like she said “Younger and plainer girls had been married off by dozens, and she was nine-and-twenty, and still Miss Bart.” This is the infuriating part about Lily. She “wants” money (“she knew she hated dinginess as much as her mother had hated it, and to her last breath she meant to fight against it, dragging herself up again and again above its flood till she gained the bright pinnacles of success which presented such a slippery surface to her clutch.”) and knows it will take work (and her beauty) but refuses suitors, makes mistakes, poor alliances, etc., which take her further away from her goals. Why? Is it that at heart, she does not want to be part of it? That she is trying to please her dead mother by becoming what she is expected to be? Does her emotionally distant father, who only served as an inadequate provider in her mother’s mind, failed her and she does not trust?
🖋These things are not fleshed out, which is what makes the writing so good and the reason I missed so much the first time around.

We get glimpses of her insight as to her unsuitability to be part of her “society.” There’s a section in the beginning where her relative, who is trying to “secure” Mr. Selden for Lily (or at least help Lily secure him) by keeping another woman (Bertha) away says: “Every one knows you’re a thousand times handsomer and cleverer than Bertha; but then you’re not nasty. And for always getting what she wants in the long run, commend me to a nasty woman.” This pretty much encapsulates Lily’s inability to “swim” in the toxic and competitive miasma of her high class world. She is unable to “sink” those around her, even to save herself and this is the tragic part. She could have ensured her own existence in that world, but she burned the letters. She could have married Selden but he was not rich enough. Never mind she kept digging a bigger hole with debts and decidedly stupid (I use this word sparingly but she should have seen the writing on the wall, hence my opinion as to self-sabotage) alliances resulting in ruination and getting further away from the “world” she craved.
.
This “money hunger,” insecurities, sense of superiority and her own inability to lower expectations combined with her lack of deviousness and meanness leads to an unsurprising end and the belated sad realizations by Selden. Lily may be contrary, entitled, and exasperating, but she was not “nasty” enough for her world. I missed that the first time I met her.😢 ( )

"She was so evidently the victim of the civilization which had produced her, that the links of her bracelet seemed like manacles chaining her to her fate."

Lily Barton lives among the rich of New York City, the creme de la creme, yet she is not rich herself. She comes from a good family, has some rich relatives, yet she must rely on the good will of her friends, as well as her beautiful face, her charm, her wit, her ability to always do and say the "right" thing. Her mission in life is to find a rich man to marry, and her ability to do so is unquestioned. Yet she has somehow arrived at the age of 29 and is still unmarried. It seems that at the last minute before sealing the deal something always causes Lily to question whether marriage to a rich man is what she really wants. Then through a series of misteps Lily finds herself on the wrong side of society's arbiters, an outcast.
I first read this as a teenager, and remember loving it, but had no actual memory of the story. Wharton writes beautifully--I've always thought she was deserving of the Nobel in literature. Wharton was a member of the class that destroyed Lily, and she presents them to us warts and all.
This is one of her earliest books, and it is the book that established her literary reputation, as well as being one of the three or four most read/most famous of her works. Some of the themes of her earlier works are fully developed here. It is an exquisite book and it deserves a place in the literary canon. This is one of the rare books I think everyone should read.

Highly recommended
5 stars ( )

57. The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
editing: editor: Janet Beer, advisor: Keith Carabine
published: 1905
format: 306-page Wordsworth Classic paperback, published 2002
acquired: September
read: Oct 27 – Nov 16
time reading: 16:32, 3.2 mpp
rating: 5
locations: New York and a stop at Monte Carlo, Monaco.
about the author: 1862-1937. Born Edith Newbold Jones on West 23rd Street, New York City. Spent most of her writing life in France.

I'm working through Wharton's longer fiction with a group on Litsy, and this is her fourth work, and second novel. It's also her first really successful work, an instant big seller in 1905, and now a classic. And it's a wonderful novel. Wharton attacks the culture of New York City's extremely wealth leisure class through fall of Lily Bart. Raised by wealthy parents, Lily's father hit financial ruin, and was basically discarded at that point by her mother. But Lily's mother sees potential in Lily's face, she thinks Lily can marry back into money.

When the novel opens Lily is 29 and still single. And we watch as she plots for marriage and then doesn't carry her plots through. The reader is left to wonder what is going on. Lily is clearly the master of the moment in any setting. She's gorgeous and fluid in higher culture, and attractive on several levels. And, supported by her childless aunt, she has just enough money to stay in that culture, and enough fortitude to keep her financial stresses out of public view and out of her outward character. All she needs is a rich husband, which should be a reasonable object for her. There are offers. But it seems what Lily wants may not want what she thinks she wants. Or there are some contradictions. It many ways this novel is a version of [Pride and Prejudice] without the happy ending. Ultimately Lily is left to the fate of her name, a flower drifting in the current, maybe even a cut flower, subject to greater and darker forces. She maybe doesn't fully realize the stakes in the kind of money she mixing with, where $10,000 is disposable, an equivalent of over $300,000 in 2021 dollars.

The cultural expose is likely what originally drew readers to this novel. Wharton was part of this leisure class and was writing what she knew. But it's the writing that makes this book still work today. She was masterful with characters, with witty insight and with situational moments. This novel largely jumps from situation-to-situation (with transitions), many with one-on-one conversations of memorable intensity. It makes for an entertaining and meaningful novel. I imagine this one has broad appeal, so recommended to anyone interested.

2021
https://www.librarything.com/topic/333774#7664261 ( )

I read long ago in college and recalled Lily Barts name and little else. Upon this re-read, what finely crafted work.
And still to many parallels to today. I had thought of a friend to recommend reading this, but thought the similarities too strong and that she might find this depressing.

Librivox ( )

Amazing. I loved it more than I loved Age of Innocence. I pitied Lily Bart because she made such poor decisions to be part of a society that was so shallow. She was also way too flighty for her own good. ( )

Weak men and predatory women eviscerate Lily. What's worse than poverty? Nothing. ( )