In this story of the home front, Paris, in World War I, we are introduced to the son who becomes a soldier, against his parents wishes. Those parents are divorced, the father an artist and the mother remarried to a rich banker. I found the portrayals of the two fathers the most interesting here. Wharton’s artist is a stereotypical artist of the working, non-genius type. He thinks about his work when he shouldn’t be, he wastes a lot of time, and he gets involved in situations to massage his ego. The banker father is played much more broadly. He is shown as caring and capable, though appears bumbling at times. The banker is there to learn from. I found the descriptions of the events in the city during wartime interesting in the kinds of things that went on, and what appears to be the same as normal times – most everything – as well as what is different – the topic of conversations is the war. It reminded me of the way much of what we talk about now in general conversation relates directly to COVID. Not a great book, but I enjoyed the historical aspects.

I wonder how this book was received in 1920. Wharton relates her experiences in France during WWI with her masterly development of characters. They jump off the pages with all their strengths and weaknesses.

I read this because it was mentioned a couple times in the book Blue Stars. I had never read any Edith Wharton and usually like the war stories focused on the people. This was just too dragged out. I couldn’t stay with it. Read a little more than half then skipped to the end to find out if the son at the front lives or died and then closed the book.

John Campton is an American artist who has long lived in Paris and become famous for his portraiture. It is August 1914 and his son, George, is arriving so the two of them can travel together to Spain. John has felt estranged from his beloved son since he and his wife divorced and she has remarried a banker who has actually raised his son. His jealousy of this colors many of his actions throughout the novel as he refuses to see that Mr. Grant cares as much for his son as he does himself.

Almost as soon as the young man arrives, war breaks out and all of their plans must be canceled. Because of a twist of fate, the young George was born in France and now is subject to being called up for duty. Campton and Grant, the stepfather, begin to do everything they can think of to keep him from serving in the trenches at the front, and his mother, Julia is nearly hysterical over the thought that her son may die. Unbeknownst to all of them, George realizes what they are doing and manages to transfer to an infantry battalion almost immediately but keeps this knowledge hidden from his parents.

A Son at the Front is not the usual expectation of an Edith Wharton novel although it is an examination of society. In this case, it takes a close look at all the people who are left behind especially the parents who are now paying for the war and its ideals in the flesh of their own bodies, so to speak. Many are doing what Campton and the Grants have tried, anything to keep their progeny out of the line of fire. Others are silently and stoically waiting for the inevitable word of their loss. This is a novel that looks closely at the ways the rest of society dealt with the upheaval the war caused in all lives at the time. Edith Wharton was known to believe that Culture and Beauty could save the world and that theme runs throughout. She paints an interesting picture of the way American/French society conducted itself throughout the war years.

The story of John Campton and his son, George, goes through many iterations. From jealousy over his relationship with the stepfather that he, John, comes to admire, to debilitating fear for his life, to pride in his determination to serve France we watch him grow to accept the inevitability of the end. I can understand why this was not well received when published. It has none of the glamour of earlier books and none of the "war action" of the memoirs and novels being published at that time. It all takes place behind the front. Still, it is a true gem of human personality.

John Campton is a renowned painter, an American living in Paris for years and more French than American in reality. His ex-wife has married a very wealthy banker, and the two of them vie for the love and attentions of their only son, George. Although Julia, the ex-wife, is also American, George was born on French soil, so he is of dual citizenship.

At the beginning of the story, Campton is planning a trip for himself and George, a chance to spend some private time together, but before they can embark on their journey, hostilities reach a breaking point and World War I erupts as Germany invades Belgium. Campton considers his son an American, but the French have him on their military roles and he is conscripted into the French army.

What ensues is a story full of sorrow and enlightenment as George and his father navigate the changing, and sometimes conflicted, feelings toward the cause before them. As the casualties begin to pile up and people begin to understand the nature of the conflict, Campton must struggle with his desire to keep his son safe and his realization that this war and its demanded sacrifices belong to every man, and most particularly to every Frenchman.

The killing of René Davril seemed to Campton one of the most senseless crimes the war had yet perpetrated. It brought home to him, far more vividly than the distant death of poor Jean Fortin, what an incalculable sum of gifts and virtues went to make up the monster’s daily meal.

What is the most unique about this book is that we follow the war, the loss, the effect through the eyes of a father. There are so many other books that show us the war from the soldier's point of view, but this is the angst of the ones who cannot participate and can only watch as all they love is put at risk. We are walked through Campton’s attempts to understand his son’s experiences and developing attitudes with only secondhand information to draw on.

He says he wants only things that last—that are permanent—things that hold a man fast. That sometimes he feels as if he were being swept away on a flood, and were trying to catch at things—at anything—as he’s rushed along under the waves… He says he wants quiet, monotony … to be sure the same things will happen every day. When we go out together he sometimes stands for a quarter of an hour and stares at the same building, or at the Seine under the bridges. But he’s happy, I’m sure… I’ve never seen him happier … only it’s in a way I can’t make out…

This is Edith Wharton at her best, as she deftly tears apart the surface of these two people and shows us everything that lies beneath. All the secondary characters, as well, are fully drawn and engaging, down to the elderly landlady who loses her son and then her grandsons to this spreading horror. And, while men die in droves, Americans in Paris wait and watch for America to understand what is at stake and enter the fray.

While reading, I thought of other novels I have read that have brought WWI home to me. All Quiet on the Western Front and Testament of Youth came to mind, and I felt Wharton was a significant addition to the canon, for she reveals yet another side of the horror. However, this novel is more universal than that, because it also deals with the intimate relationships that bind and separate people, the petty jealousy that prevents sharing and the small moments of understanding that create bonds that are unbreakable. So that, in the end, you might learn to see life, not only from your own view, but from that of others.

What did such people as Julia do with grief, he wondered, how did they make room for it in their lives, get up and lie down every day with its taste on their lips? Its elemental quality, that awful sense it communicated of a whirling earth, a crumbling Time, and all the cold stellar spaces yawning to receive us…

What an excellent work of art this book is. As I have often said, Edith Wharton is one of the great writers. I am in awe of how she can deliver, over and over again, books that leave such an impression upon the heart, the mind, and the soul. I will not be forgetting this one.

Wharton's writing is simply gorgeous. The story is mainly seen from the parents' point of view, especially John Campton, George's father. The horrors of what parents go through when their child goes to war are riveting, yet I wanted to view the war more through George's eyes since he is the son of said title. Still a pick mainly for Wharton's understanding of France during such a turbulent period of history.

Edith Wharton is always so great. This book was gutting. The perspective of parents sending their sons off to war. The story was so nuanced and through the different characters she showed the complexity of supporting a cause but still not wanting to lose your own loved ones, as well as the different reactions of society.

Review forthcoming.

It has been a very long time since I read anything by Edith Wharton. This one surprised me, because it was so different in setting, plot, and atmosphere from the ones I have read. I downloaded it from Library of America, which often send out links to American short stories, and they remarked that A Son at the Front has gotten little attention.

Written only a few years after WWI ended, this is the story of an American artist living in Paris whose son, because he was born in Paris even though h is parents are both American, is considered French for the purposes of the draft. The father, along with some of the other main characters, undergoes a transformation in his thinking about the war as the book progresses. The writing was so evocative, the characters so nuanced, the descriptions of the war so vivid!

Reading about the book after I finished it, I discovered that Wharton had lived in France before the war, and returned there shortly after France entered the war.

After reading this, I want to read/reread more of her novels.

I read the free version available on Gutenberg.

The publisher's description calls this Wharton's "anti-war masterpiece." Really? I didn't find it to be all that anti-war, it was, and it was certainly anti-rich folk who run the world in a stupid way and cause pointless death for their own petty amusements (her basic theme in everything).

Anyway, I have lots of thoughts on this - and I really didn't like it much at the beginning because I thought it all too simple and predictable and boring. I've read enough Wharton, that I should have known better. The main characters were all so well done, and the somewhat unlikeable Campton struggled and grew and changed on pretty much every page. He starts out thinking that he's better than the other rich folk in his ex-patriot circle, but its made clear to the reader that he is every bit as shallow and self centered. And then, instead of just making him a jerk, he starts to realize it. And he tries to do better -- and has a real hard time. And then Wharton goes on to show all the problems that crop up with charity work. The petty squabbles and competitions of those who are trying to run the programs for their own glory, and sometimes ineffectiveness of those who are doing the work for the best of reasons, but are simply incompetent. I guess this is why I've come to love Wharton - nothing is every black and white. Nothing is simple. The wealthy Mr. Mayhew, is a shining example. Starts out as a delegate for the Peace Commission, then he milks a (not very) harrowing experience with the German army, becomes a chief agent to get the US to get involved. To accomplish his ends, he and his other incredibly wealthy friends take over a charity that was doing excellent work (albeit in a small and quiet way), and basically turns it into a club for the rich who want to feel that they are doing something. I think perhaps one of the funniest lines was when Mr. Mayhew, who has no actually employment and never has, tells Compton how important it is that he (Mayhew) "rests" (or vacations) regularly so maintain his power to advocate for US involvement in the war. Its kind of like Peloton telling us that we need to buy their $1500.00 exercise bike, we owe it to ourselves to be our best selves. Was it Dove chocolate that had the advertising tag line that was something like, what have you done for yourself today? Somehow marketing has sold us the idea that we cannot be unselfish until we have first been selfish. Hmm.

So, was this an anti-war novel? Well, Wharton in no way disrespects the troops on the ground, their sacrifices or their ideals. Its clear that she has nothing but admiration for the dedicated men dying on the ground (and the dedication of the families supporting them at home). She certainly finds some of them naive, but she doesn't mock them. Do the 'leaders' get taken down? Not so much the military leaders -- but the government bureaucracies and the rich folks that lean on them -- they surely don't get any love. That's part of the complexity of Campton -- he doesn't mind using his ex-wife's $$ to wring benefits for his wounded son, but he also realizes how wrong the whole system is. He just decides he doesn't care.

Wharton was in France during WWI, she did a lot of real work with the Red Cross (according to a documentary I saw). She saw the raw side of the war first hand.

I had a hard time with this read - Campton Sr was so self-absorbed, oblivious to his own hypocrisy in his jealousy and bitterness toward Brant, and for the vast majority of the book was borderline (or not so borderline) repellant. A few moments of decency, but most of them were still clouded by his pettiness toward Mr. Brant. In the end, I just wanted it to be over. I wouldn't rate this as a "masterpiece" for Wharton, frankly.

WWI story of father and son

I had to search for this book, hearing about it first in a course I took on WWI. Instead of being a story of a soldier son at the front, it tells the story of his family in Paris. Wharton brings together the struggle of divorced parents, the impact of the war on daily life, and in the forefront a father coming to terms with his son's decisions and his own art. I recommend it to anyone who reads Wharton these days or is a student of WWI?