Society Of New York As Edith Wharton example essay topic

Edith Wharton was born Edith Newbold Jones on January 24, 1862 in New York City. She was the youngest of three children. All though her birth was unexpected and unwanted, Edith was raised as if she was an only child. Her mother, Lucretia Stevens Rhinelander, was the granddaughter of an American Revolutionary patriot, and the daughter of a wealthy landowner. Her father had inherited his wealth from his parents.

During the first few years of Ms. Wharton's life, her family and her spent their winters in New York and their summers in Rhode Island. Ms. Wharton didn't receive an education while she was growing up, but she was lucky enough to be able to use her father's library and was privately educated by tutors. She spent most of her earlier years reading rather then participating in any other activities that people her age did. When she was four years old, her parents took her on a trip to Europe.

She got to visit places like Rome and Paris. It was there when Ms. Wharton started becoming interested in things such as Greek and Roman Gods. She eventually learned to read, write, and speak in German, French, and Italian because of the tutoring and touring of such places. After six years, when Ms. Wharton was ten, she and her family returned from Europe back to the United States. Edith didn't know what to make of it.

She had mixed emotions about New York City. She missed such things in Europe such as the glamour and fashion, and was overwhelmed by he insanity of New York City. She was however delighted to see her family and friends both in New York City and Rhode Island. In the United States Ms. Wharton continued to study Modern Languages.

Edith's family and most of her friends' families were not working people. They lived on their incomes and investments. Occasionally, Edith and her family attended the Theatre and the Opera. When Edith turned seventeen, she joined her parents on another trip to Europe, this time for her father's health. He died two years later, when Edith was nineteen, leaving her and her mother alone in Europe.

They both returned to New York City and moved into a new home that they had purchased. With the death of Ms. Wharton's father, some problems awaited. They were now considered to be in the lower class of society. Edith knew the only way to pull the family back up to the standards at which they once were, was to marry someone for money. When Edith was twenty-one, she became engaged to a man named Harry Steven. Unfortunately, it didn't end up in marriage because Harry's mother didn't think Ms. Wharton was well off enough for her son.

(Lovett 148) Ms. Wharton didn't seem upset about her ended engagement. Her friends said she just shrugged it off and said that Harry wasn't a strong enough man to stand up to his mother. She would often say that his health and his attitude of life in general is what caused his death shortly after their breakup. (Joslin 284) In 1885, when Ms. Wharton was twenty-three, she married Mr. Edward Wharton. Mr. Wharton was a banker from Boston, and was thirteen years her senior. Although they didn't share the same tastes in literature and writing, they did have a lot in common.

They both enjoyed animals, the outdoor life and they both loved to travel. Mr. Wharton often discouraged Ms. Wharton's intellect, telling her that it wasn't womanly enough to write. This caused Ms. Wharton to have severe depression and was prescribed medications. The Wharton's did however take vacations to Europe and spent most of their time on the hills of Northern Italy.

No matter where she lived though, she always felt disapproved by Edward and his family. She would eventually leave New York, and never return. For the next twenty years, Ms. Wharton traveled often to Europe. She felt more at home in Europe then she did in America. She eventually made France her home. While in Europe, Ms. Wharton started to begin publishing many of her poems and novels.

She would soon be appreciated and regarded as being her own person, no longer just her husband's possession. She became an individual. Her story, "Fullness of my life" was about her marriage to Mr. Wharton. (Allen 1) The dreams and unfulfilled marriage still weren't enough to have her tell herself that it wasn't what she wanted. She was trying to persuade herself into loving him, but in the end, she realized that it couldn't be done. Her husbands cheating and money problems led Edith to look at him differently, and she knew the marriage wasn't worth saving.

She divorced him in 1913. Many in the society looked down on the divorce, but Edith was tired of caring about what others thought. Ms. Wharton had many friendships with men throughout her life. Her longest friendship was with a man by the name of Walter Berry who she met in 1884, before she married her ex husband. They met again in 1897. Ms Wharton was never certain of Berry's feelings towards her.

Berry helped Ms. Wharton with her writing, by criticism and teachings. Mr. Berry and Edith remained friends for thirty years, up until he died in her arms in 1928. She referred to him as her soul mate. In her own words, "Walter found me when my mind and soul were hungry and thirsty. He fed me until out last hour together". (Howard 84) Edith Wharton never married again.

The life of Edith Wharton shows in her work. She wrote about things such as society and strong women, women who could stand up for themselves even when the real society wouldn't let women do that. Women in her day loved her writing because it let them see that they could be strong. Many of her writings were written after the age of forty and after her marriage. She was able to finally enjoy her life and be friends with people she wanted to associate herself with.

She enjoyed a full life from then on and had many friends. Her writings were her children and she loved each of them. Edith Wharton was in the midst of writing her biography when she suffered a stroke and died in 1937. She was seventy-five years old. She was buried next to her good friend and soul mate Walter Berry in the United States. EDITH WHARTON'S INFLUENCES New York City society was a major influence in Edith Wharton's life.

The society discouraged her from achieving anything past a marriage. It required her to keep quiet and silent. These restrictions caused her to reveal her emotions through her work. The restrictions of New York created a repressive environment for Wharton in her early youth. Her world was made up of strict social codes and proper behavior, that if not followed could have major consequences. Most of Wharton's stories are about wealthy people, usually women, who challenged society much like Wharton did.

Wharton lived at a time when roles of women were very limited and guidelines were set for what was acceptable behavior and what was not. These guidelines were very strict and specific. The fear of not meeting the standards, along with an unhappy twenty-eight year marriage to Edward Wharton and the fact that writing novels was considered something more of a job than a knowledge or talent were just the inspirations that Wharton needed to make noticeable the imprisonment of women as well as her writing skills. Not only did she believe that these women were physically trapped within the four walls of their homes, but that they were also trapped psychologically by the circumstances of the social status as well as their gender. Wharton was a severe critic of society. Her stories seemed to blame many problems on the rules for the wealthy.

She was very harsh on men in her novels, and made them appear very weak in her stories. Even though she knew that men were the ones who had all the power in the real society, but no one escaped without being criticized in her stories. Marriage, children and home keeping were to be the number one priorities of a woman's life, and Wharton was a master at showing how those images may be blessings for some women, but for others might have felt like a prison that took their spirits away from them. You can see from some of her stories that Wharton tries to expose how some women are given and are told by society what they must have in their lives. Those things are family, home and security. These were all things that influenced her ideas and stories.

For Edith Wharton to question the political correctness of the times, it was not unexpected. She was not the only writer of her time to question the attitudes of the twentieth century. One of her most influential writers, Henry James, who was also one of her closest friends, was also involved in the same type of criticism writing. His friendship along with his guidance helped Ms. Wharton to develop her style. For Henry James and Edith Wharton, it gave them the opportunity to show exactly what was going on in their social structures, and gave them the opportunity to present their talents. In Edith Wharton's final story, she presents an image of a woman who is alone and widowed for years, but appears to be extremely happy and surviving at a comfortable level.

This was her biggest inspiration, her own life. After divorcing her husband of twenty-eight years, Wharton never remarried, but the thought of remarrying never even crossed her mind. She was happy where she was and the people she was with. All of these gave her the inspiration to write all of the novels that she did.

EDITH WHARTON'S WORKS Edith Wharton is best known for her novels and stories about the upper class society. In her long career, which stretched over forty years and included the publication of more than forty books, Wharton portrayed an image of the American life. Wharton's writing career was launched one hundred years ago, with the publication of her first book in 1897, The Decorations of Houses, which she wrote with her architect. Some of the characters that Wharton chose, such as Ellen Olen ska in The Age of Innocence, Ethan Frome in Ethan Frome, and Lily Bart in The House of Mirth, are some of the most memorable characters in American Literature.

Often they were portrayed as victims of the cruel society. Many times, they were women who were trapped in bad relationships, or imprisoned circumstances. Her own life was an example of the obstacles that a woman of her time and place had to overcome to find self-realization. In the 1890's, Wharton started contributing some of her short stories to Scribner's magazine.

She gained her first literary success with her book, The House of Mirth in 1905, a story about Lily Bart, a beautiful but poor woman trying to survive in New York City. Following that novel were The Reef (1912), The Custom of the Country (1913), and Summer (1917). The Americans Wharton met abroad provided the raw materials for these novels. Wharton eventually settled permanently in France.

In Paris, Wharton found companionship in places where artists and writers mingled with the rich and where women played a major role in society. In 1908, Wharton began having an affair with Morton Fullerton, a journalist for the London Times. In her diary she revealed her joy in their passionate lovemaking and the love she felt with him, all of which she had been painfully missing in her marriage. During World War I, she dedicated her time to aiding refugees from France and Belgium. She created schools for them and established workrooms where she employed women who had no means of support and raised funds for these projects on her own.

Wharton also wrote reports for publication back in America, which played a big part in urging the United States to join the war effort. Among Wharton's most famous novels was The Age of Innocence (1920), which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. The Age of Innocence involves a love triangle, as do many of Wharton's novels. It illustrates the need for men and women to find passion within an ordered and controlled society. It seems to refer to her own experiences of life in a noble society. The novel proposes that society have a large influence on the people of New York.

Although Wharton is sentimental about New York, she also shows the irony of society's limitations and its narrow mindedness. Her life shows in her work. She wrote about society and yet she wrote of strong women. Women who could stand up for themselves even when the real society wouldn't let them do that. In her novel House of Mirth, the main character, Lily Bart hid her smoking habit because smoking was not a womanly thing. Wharton too hid her smoking for a long time.

Maybe that is why her work was so important in her day. She wrote of life, she wrote of women, she wrote of strong women. Women in her day lover her writings because it let them see that they too could be strong. The women's movement happened not too long after that and is still going on today. She was able to finally enjoy her life and be friends with people she wanted to be associated with. Her writings were her children and she loved each one of them.

EDITH WHARTON'S LEGAL Edith Wharton had changed so much from the shy girl she was. She continued to write and publish until the time of her death in 1917 in France. No author has been able to capture the society of New York as Edith Wharton did. Her works have been successfully adapted for stage and screen, as she will continue to captivate audiences for years.

Wharton has emerged as a major early twentieth century American author. Her novels shed some light on the complicated world of upper class society. That was a world, which few authors of her time could explore with such accuracy and authority. She exposed in her writings many of the social hypocrisies that shaped Americas rapidly changing upper class. Her importance however went further beyond the upper class society that she helped expose to the public. Wharton has influenced the imaginations of many other writers.

Writers of her time, as well as those she continues to inspire today.