**Updated review including the remaining stories**
This book by Edith Wharton, like most of her works, deals with the conflict between individual purpose and societal expectations. Through the lens of 4 different stories, each one talking about a different decade in the 1800s, we get to see how the closely-knit and tightly controlled New York elite conducted themselves in their private and public lives. Every action was ruthlessly scrutinized and accounted for; each step had to be taken with universal caution as any lapse could taint the steadfastly spotless names of their families. In spite of this, a small section of both men and women lived life on their own terms which Edith Wharton describes as “subtle revolts against the heartlessness of social routine”

In the second novella called “Old Maid”, two young women who are bound by social customs stand up for love. In the 1850s, an unmarried woman, Charlotte, has to abandon her newborn child in the interest of propriety. Her married cousin, Delia, comes to her rescue and promises to take care of the foundling baby, Tina. Delia has her own way of carrying things off where she does not explain her action, "behaving as if nothing had happened that needed to be accounted for" and the society desists from speculation. In a time when anchoring yourself to a man was the most acceptable goal of womanhood, Charlotte stays unmarried to stay close to Tina and lives with her as an aunt. The beauty of this story lies in the tender and complex relationship that Tina’s two mothers share as they oscillate between extreme emotions for each other. Charlotte is deeply grateful to Delia for loving her daughter as her own but at the same time, she seethes with resentment as Delia is the object of motherly affection for Tina. The more practical Delia pities the passionate Charlotte who has been forced to stifle her motherhood but this feeling is tinged with jealousy –Tina is a constant reminder of a future relinquished as she was also in love with Tina’s biological father. And sometimes this force of bitterness becomes overpowering – not leading to any open disagreements but stirring up rancor which finds its way into their hearts so often, bringing about friction followed by repentance.

The remaining stories pale in comparison to "Old Maid". Though they have the usual Wharton trademark, chronicling the silent dual between society and individuality, and are very well written, they don't shimmer as bright as the centerpiece. In the last story, "New Year's Day", the wife's philandering actions have a slightly melodramatic justification which failed to satisfy me. The remaining two stories "False Dawn" and "The Spark" are intricate in their depiction of the behaviour expected of the members of this coterie and the socially sanctioned castigation for those who don't confirm. Four decades is a considerable period for a shift in social conventions yet this clique of New Yok's elite doesn't readily change its ways during the course of these four stories.

It's been a couple of months since I read these four novellas that comprise the book Old New York. Wharton is amazing when she is writing about the upper crust of New England Society, and she deals with four decades of New York Society in the four novellas here.

The False Dawn deals with a father and son relationship. The son is commissioned by the father to buy "real" art in Europe, and he makes a genuine effort to actually buy good art by unknown artists. The father is not pleased and ultimately cuts off his son from his will leaving him with only the paintings. The Spark deals with a decent but simple man with a horrid wife, and who becomes enamored with the ideas Walt Whitman. New Years Day is about a woman with a dying husband who has an extra marital affair with a rake. The best known story of the lot is The Old Maid which was made into a movie with the inimitable Bette Davis. The story deals with the old maid, really an unwed mother, who has to turn to her cousin to take care of her little girl. This makes her bitter and resentful, but still willing to do everything she can to protect her girl from stigma.

My favorite among the lot is also The Old Maid. There is something so compelling and poignant in the portrayal of Charlotte Lovell, the unwed mother and the old maid, that had the other stories beat. I also liked The False Dawn and New Years Day. The only turkey in the collection, for me, was The Spark, which I've forgotten already. I'm not sure it ever stuck in my mind, to be honest. In any case, it's a must read for Wharton fans, especially her The Age of Innocence or The House of Mirth fans, as this collection too deals with society, manners and conventions - false and hypocritical though they may be. Wharton has a keen insight to human foibles, and it comes through in these stories. Her prose is engaging as usual.

Worth checking out.

always a pleasure

…

3.75 stars. Series of Novellas placed in different decades of 19th Century New York. Not as good as Age of Innocence but I can't help but love Edith Wharton's writing style. I liked the last one the most- New Year's Day.

This was my first foray into Wharton aside from her big-name novels and I found it to be a quick read that delves into a breadth of societal issues and human emotions in classic Wharton style.

Retrospective thoughts on each novella:

False Dawn: the emotional meat of this novella is in Lewis's struggle to reconcile his desires and tendencies with his family and community's expectations, and that feels like it should be the main takeaway. However, the closing, which reveals that Lewis's "worthless" gallery became widely recognized as a valuable and well curated treasure well after his death, is what stuck with me the most. Maybe it's the fuzzy correlation between popularity and greatness, maybe it's the subjectivity in artistic value, or maybe it's the brevity of human life next to the generational impact of art, but that's what stuck.

The Old Maid: this one felt the most novel-like (as opposed to novella-like) of the bunch, if that makes any sense. You can feel the mental and emotional turmoil of the characters quivering through the pages even as they mask it in 1850s calmness and remove, and Wharton's handling of a domestic situation spiced with scandal- a secret illegitimate child, dueling maternal cares- is done with a gravity and nuance that feel very modern. It raises questions about the nature of motherhood, of blood verses nurture, and how unrequited or unknown maternal love is a uniquely painful state of affairs that hurts on a much different level than romantic heartbreak. A stage adaptation won the Pulitzer Prize for drama in '35 and I can see how the character dynamics would play out beautifully on the stage.

The Spark: had some commentary on marriage and society but the sticking point was similar to False Dawn for me. Hayley Delane had an encounter with a stranger (who is, of course, Walt Whitman) while recovering in a hospital camp from a Civil War injury, and the stranger's memory stays with him and whispers in his ear from that moment on. Decades later, the much younger narrator discovers the identity of Delane's stranger and reads him some of Whitman's poetry, and Delane decides he didn't want to know that Whitman wrote such rubbish, in essence. Woah. Here we run into the disconnect between artists as people and artists as, well, artists, and the disproportionate impact that the well-timed kindness of strangers can have. Lots to unpack here in a relatively short and straightforward work.

New Year's Day: this felt almost like an O'Henry. Great looks at love and the limitations of being a woman in the 1870s. Also great looks at the shortsightedness and conclusion-jumping tendencies of society. I found Lizzie's descent into loneliness after the affair to be the most touching part; she was raised for a very particular niche and without it was nothing. A common theme with Wharton it seems.

All in all, while Old New York doesn't quite reach the heights of House of Mirth or Age of Innocence, it's still a wonderful way to pass a few afternoons and get another peek into that marvelous brain of Edith Wharton's.

mi-a placut foarte tare scriitura lui edith wharton. este foarte atenta la detalii si foarte fina cunoscatoare a firii umane.
are aplomb si elocventa, un fel foarte particular de a scrie, fiind foarte sensibila. dar foarte lucida in acelasi timp.
cunoastereaa foarte bine a lumii din care facea parte o ajuta sa isi caracterizeze personajele foarte bine si astfel sa creeze caractere particulare.
cele 4 nuvele sunt fiecare o bijuterie in sine, care poarta un farmec al unei societati de mult apuse.

I love Edith Wharton. I love her writing style, her insights, her understanding of the world of upper-crust New York (a world I can only ever get a glimpse of through the eyes of others), and her even deeper understanding of the human heart. I cannot say I am always fond of the short-story as a genre, but these novellas are really just short stories, and I enjoyed them every one.

In False Dawn, she shows us the ridiculous criteria on which the values of society are sometimes based and the injustice that can be heaped upon the head of a man who steps outside the norms others have set for him.

The Old Maid was my favorite in the book and the reason I elected a 5-star instead of a 4-star rating. This story, that deals with an illegitimate child and how the situation is handled by the mother and her cousin, is a perfect short story/novella for me. The subject matter is one we so seldom see addressed during this time, being as taboo a thing to speak of as to do. The ironies are myriad and the feelings of the two women are as sharp as broken glass.

Both The Spark and New Year's Day are interesting and well written. The latter particularly impressed me for its illustration of how things are not always what they seem to be and how often we think we know about someone from what we observe and have them pegged completely wrong.

As with all of her works, these have elements of tragedy that run through them like rising rivers. They swell and overflow and the characters themselves are at their mercy and stand no chance of stemming the waters. Perhaps growing up in Old New York, a privileged daughter of a very wealthy man, Edith Wharton was accustomed to others looking at her life and believing it perfect and blessed. Perhaps, from the inside, she saw how imperfect life could be regardless of the money or status one held. She certainly became a master at conveying that in her stories. Her ability to find the humanity in the midst of the oppressive societal conventions made her the first woman to win the Pulitizer Prize, a distinction she well deserved.

I enjoyed these novellas; some more than others. False Dawn and The Spark had irony that reared it's head at the end. I think that False Dawn may have been my favorite and New Year's Day my least favorite. It was an enjoyable way to spend reading for a few days.

False Dawn - 4 Stars
The Old Maid - 3 Stars
The Spark - 2 Stars
New Year's Day - 3.5 Stars

The first novella is the gem of the book - showing us a young man sent abroad for the Grand Tour for two years, with the instructions to see Europe and the Near East, and to return with some grand art for the old man. The son comes back with some art alright, but it drives a wedge between him and most of his family. The son doesn't give up, but the old adage that being early to a great investment is a face-saving euphemism for being wrong stands as true as the other old adage that outstanding art is rarely valued in its own time. Wharton really hit it with this one.

The Old Maid depicted a scandal and the delicate balance of a relationship between two middle-aged women and the young lady they're raising. A solid expose' of trying to do what's best while preserving one's own self amidst tough circumstances.

I found the Spark to be be disjointed, not terribly interesting, and with a hokey ending featuring a big name in American literary history.

Wharton closed strong with more scandal in New Year's Eve, detailing an affair and the societal response to it. The strength, however, was in how the 'scandalized' woman was ultimately the one in control, with the 15 pages of dialog between Mrs. Hazeldean and Henry Prest top notch stuff. The overall story was not as strong, but bravo on that scene.

Overall, I'll give this a 4.5 star rating.

Edith Wharton has slowly become one of my favorite classic authors. After reading Ethan Frome last year, I was really excited to pick up another book by her. I decided to pick up this because it contained four novellas roughly around the same length as Ethan Frome.

I really enjoyed most of them, however, I did start to realize how much exposition she was trying to tell in such a short number of pages. It was a bit overwhelming at times with all the character names and family trees. But the themes and the scandals were on point as always.

My favorites were The Old Maid and New Year's Day. In terms of conversation and themes discussed, The Old Maid takes the cake. But in terms of actual storytelling, I think New Year's Day was the best.

False Dawn: 4.5 stars
The Old Maid: 5 stars
The Spark: 2.5 stars
New Year's Day: 5 stars

I'm not sure there are many writers who can craft such subtle yet striking social commentary. Here, Wharton's observational powers shine in each of the novellas, which take place--respectively--in the 1840s, 50s, 60s, and 70s. In them, she shrewdly depicts the changing social mores among the New York elite, her subjects ranging from aesthetics to slavery to illegitimate children. Each story provides a keen look into the period in question.