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A review by libraryofdreaming
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
4.0
NEVER was a book more ironically titled. I feel as if I have been pummeled through a train wreck of depression. A beautiful train wreck, but still saturated with doom and the unattainability of happiness and love.
Lily Bart has risen very high on the list of characters I would like to shake and then take home and snuggle in a blanket. I may need a PROTECT LILY BART t-shirt or something. What a beautifully written, tragic character! You hate her sometimes and you love her other times, but above all want to save her from her fate. I think she really is a product of her literary time and yet again I am impressed with Edith Wharton's ability to portray and criticize the Gilded Age. It is also a testament to Wharton's skill that we are able to see the pathos and the ridiculousness of Lily's situation. Comfortably sitting in the 21st century, we could be tempted to condemn Lily completely for so desperately wanting wealth and a position in "society", but I could not do so. The pangs of betrayal, poverty, and even a craving for social success still reverberate to our time. I could even see a little of my darker self in the want to be received as a equal, but still revered as something more. I think it was a very good thing I had seen the movie before I read the book, otherwise I would have been absolutely destroyed by every failure and plot twist. Even knowing what a first-time reader would not know, each little rise and fall of hope gave me a pang. The book reads exactly like a classic tragedy as each hope is cruelly dashed by fate.
Even with its extremely depressing tone, this book is still fascinating and worthy to be revered as a classic. I'm not sure it will attain a place on my favorites list because of its sad tone, but I still admire its beautiful language, the cruel yet clever plots, and the little drops of truth scattered throughout its pages.
Lily Bart has risen very high on the list of characters I would like to shake and then take home and snuggle in a blanket. I may need a PROTECT LILY BART t-shirt or something. What a beautifully written, tragic character! You hate her sometimes and you love her other times, but above all want to save her from her fate. I think she really is a product of her literary time and yet again I am impressed with Edith Wharton's ability to portray and criticize the Gilded Age. It is also a testament to Wharton's skill that we are able to see the pathos and the ridiculousness of Lily's situation. Comfortably sitting in the 21st century, we could be tempted to condemn Lily completely for so desperately wanting wealth and a position in "society", but I could not do so. The pangs of betrayal, poverty, and even a craving for social success still reverberate to our time. I could even see a little of my darker self in the want to be received as a equal, but still revered as something more. I think it was a very good thing I had seen the movie before I read the book, otherwise I would have been absolutely destroyed by every failure and plot twist. Even knowing what a first-time reader would not know, each little rise and fall of hope gave me a pang. The book reads exactly like a classic tragedy as each hope is cruelly dashed by fate.
Even with its extremely depressing tone, this book is still fascinating and worthy to be revered as a classic. I'm not sure it will attain a place on my favorites list because of its sad tone, but I still admire its beautiful language, the cruel yet clever plots, and the little drops of truth scattered throughout its pages.