I am dumping this after listening to half. I cannot bear it another minute longer. My displeasure is with the book. I have no criticism whatsoever with how the audiobook was read. David Horovitch reads the audiobook very well.

Edith Wharton does accurately depict upper class NYC society of the 1870s. I will even go so far as to say her depiction is astute. We are delivered "The Gilded Age" in miniature. It was Mark Twain who coined the phrase in the 1920s saying that the last decades of the 19th century had been a period that glittered on the surface but was corrupt underneath. And sad. Life is no longer to be lived joyously but restricted by senseless social mores. So, I am not criticizing Wharton's depiction, I am merely voicing my opinion that the book in its total accuracy is a book without zest. Love is without passion, boring and insipid.

Newland Archer is to marry Mary Welland. She is pretty and it is a perfect society match. Or is it? When you are head over heels in love do you need to convince yourself that what you are feeling is love? In comes Mary's cousin, Ellen Olenska, separated from her husband the bad Count Olenski. Do you hear my mocking tone? Good! The story is predictable from the start. On dumping the book, I went and checked Wiki. Exactly what I guessed would happen happened.

If I am going to be given a love story I want passion.

At the start, I was hoping that Ellen´s scorn and disregard for convention might possibly save the story. No, she wasn’t enough. Wharton's message is for me only a veiled critique rather than an outright condemnation. Look at the title - Age of Innocence! The book was the author’s twelfth novel, written after the First World War when she was in her fifties. Wharton’s nostalgia, love of and for times past, robs the book of vigor.

In that I have given the two books I have read by Edith Wharton, this and Ethan Frome, both one star, I will not be reading more by this author. I have gone on and read more. Summer I have given four stars, The House of Mirth three and her short story Xingu three too.

I was pleasantly surprised how hooked I was to the story, it bewildered me how American society being "newer" than European society was still so pretentious and how exhausting it was being up to code with society... which in turn was charitable only to those who were willing to fit in.."decency over courage" and a woman that was mired in a terrible marriage but turned a blind eye was more revered than a woman who wanted to her own freedom and rights. My heart went out to both May and Ellen... and I admire how both of them remained resolute in their characters but even with the characterization as "predictable vs. different" still showed integrity. Not the same could be said of Archer who just tried his best to "explain away" everything to have his way.

Before writing this review I decided to find out a bit more about Edith Wharton. Turns out that she is actually a lot more interesting than some of her books. If you turn to the Wikipedia page (not exactly hardcore research, I know but I'm not in a position to march off to the library and start wading through Wharton's presumably numerous biographies) you'll be faced with a picture of a timid and pretty dour looking lady with two disagreeable looking Paris-Hilton porta-dogs plonked on her knee.

Don't let appearances fool you ladies and gentlemen, for Wharton was a regular social and creative dynamo; designer, socialite, writer, Knight (Chevalier of the legion of honour for her work in France during the war) there was no stopping this woman.

So back to The Age of Innocence. What's it all about? Mostly about how being young, rich and desirable and mixing with the cream of society isn't all it is cracked up to be. Why? Well because high society is actually incredibly dull. Really? Yup. In order to set themselves apart from the grubby minions who do the dishes, drive the coaches and actually work for a living, "society" set about creating a set of hideously constrictive rules and moral guidelines which sap the joy, happiness, fun, freedom of expression and general day to day life out of everyone involved.

It is incredibly ironic that everyone then strives to get accepted into this set when everyone who's already there is so damned miserable most of the time. Most of Wharton's principal characters are unhappy with their lot and lead a treading-on-eggshells existence because they're terrified out of their wits about any kind of scandal. Obviously scandal of sorts does ensue but everyone deals with it very nicely, calmly and diplomatically without any mud slinging or calling in Piers Morgan.

Clearly a lot has changed... now massive scandal can be a potentially lucrative money earner if you have the right press connections and in certain cities (Lets pretend I don't live in one of them) people set out to bed a sleb (celebrity) and then launch a modelling/music/TV career based on the back of some good quality kiss and tell anecdotes.

The best thing about this book for me was the names of the main characters. Not satisfied with a range of traditional names (you will find no James, Johns, Matthews or Mikes here reader) Wharton presented me with a barrage of people with names like Newland Archer, Manson Mingott, Sillerton Jackson, Emerson Sillerton and Dallas Archer. Eek! Perhaps the silliness of the names mirrors Whartons' own slightly mocking perspective on the society she herself inhabited.

If I had been brought up in high society I would have probably had to kick off my satin slippers and throw myself under the wheels of the first passing horse and carriage as soon as I entered adulthood. Who would want to live in such constrained times? Not I.

Some romances efficiently drive others from the mind! If we had to classify this book by Edith Wharton, it would be difficult not to stick to the romance label.
In the time of innocence, she shows how bourgeois New York society only functions on pre-established codes for which no one can remember the reasons (see specific passages on dress rules) but which nevertheless govern the whole—relationships between individuals, including at the most personal level. The happiness of individuals never seems to be the end goal and is even a variable to consider. The New World seeks to distance itself from the Old while copying it.
However, the romance aspect is not entirely obscured. On the contrary, it is in the foreground with a nuanced analysis of the feelings, thoughts, and renunciations that cross the two main characters, caught in this societal straitjacket and dreaming of breaking free from it. And where we touch, the masterpiece is all conveyed by small innuendo touches that leave the reader in suspense. Thus, you will understand what made The Time of Innocence a significant work, which justifies 2019 as a new translation closer to the original.
Wharton was almost 60 when the book was published, and her innocence was arguably gone. However, her words suggest that, like her characters, she would have liked to find time for a kiss.

★★★★☆ (4,5/5)

Edith Wharton fue la primera mujer galardonada con el premio Pulitzer en 1921 gracias a su aclamada y prestigiosa obra «La edad de la inocencia». Tras disfrutar enormemente con sus dos novelas cortas «Ethan Frome» y «Las hermanas Bunner» decidí que esta sería la siguiente que debía leer.

En esta historia conoceremos a Newland Archer, un joven y prometedor abogado que está prometido con May Welland, una chica inocente y conservadora; los dos pertenecientes a grandes e influyentes familias neoyorquinas. La aparición de Ellen Olenska (prima de May) será el detonante que hará tambalear el futuro planificado de la pareja. Con su llegada de Europa tras huir de un marido infiel y maltratador, revolucionará la cotidianidad de toda la familia.

A partir de ese momento, seremos partícipes de la inestabilidad que crea a su alrededor Ellen y en consecuencia de como Newland intenta rebelarse mentalmente ante el nacimiento de nuevos sentimientos que le embargan. A pesar de que el protagonista principal es el mencionado con anterioridad, Madame Olenska ha recibido toda mi atención.

En esta novela se cuestiona y se critica duramente la moral de la alta sociedad neoyorquina de la década de 1870, en la que Europa representa una clara amenaza. Son los últimos años de esta época puritana y clasista la que nos muestra extraordinariamente Wharton, cuando Nueva York era altamente conservadora y reinaba la perpetuidad del honor y la inquebrantable respetabilidad de las normas sociales.

También hay que destacar las tramas secundarias introducidas por la autora que aportan una visión exquisita sobre lo que podría suceder si se dejaran llevar y abandonaran la ética y moralidades impuestas. Tiene un final algo desconcertante que culmina la historia de una manera magistral.

En definitiva, nos encontramos ante una novela que evoca la infelicidad de todos sus personajes, la infatigable hipocresía que los acecha, el deseo de ser aceptados ante la sociedad que es lo que definitivamente les impide progresar y realizarse como seres libres. Wharton, con una narración sublime, sencilla, evocadora y meticulosa que ahonda en el convencionalismo social, brilla y sorprende una vez más.

A book written in the 1920s. It takes place in the 1870s. It is about how rich Americans are stupid and let society rule their lives.

The taste of the usual was like cinders in his mouth, and there were moments when he felt as if he were being buried alive under his future.

Soundtrack for this majestic novel? Old Money by Lana Del Rey. Give this song a listen and tell me you can't feel the power, passion, longing, and heartache echoed in the novel.

Where have you been? Where did you go?
Those summer nights seem long ago
And so is the girl you use to call
The queen of New York City

But if you send for me, you know I'll come
And if you call for me, you know I'll run
I'll run to you, I'll run to you
I'll run, run, run

Now on to the review. Ah, Newland Archer, my love, my heart! As a woman in 2016, it was refreshing to read about a man in love. It feels like modern media usually portrays women as the desperate, clingy, unreasonable and unrealistically passionate ones. The truth is, we're all susceptible to the foolishness and intensity that comes with being in love.

In the beginning of the novel, Archer is accepting and eager about his role and future in society - son, lawyer, bachelor, husband, father. It's the familiar and reliable path followed by the best of his male family, friends and colleagues. There's a comfort in knowing that your major life decisions are predestined, planned and orchestrated by others. Archer learns, however, what he must give up for that comfort. Complacent in his engagement with May Welland, he meets her vivacious and worldly cousin Countess Ellen Olenska and discovers how passionate and surprising his life could be. This awakening causes an internal crisis for Archer. By sticking to the status quo and doing what is expected of him, he gives up many of his liberties. But if he forsakes society, he brings dishonor to his reputation and isolates himself and anyone associated with him. It is this struggle that is the driving force in the novel.

The Age of Innocence is a brilliant portrait of upperclass New York City in the 1870s. I went in with very high expectations for this novel - this is the second book by Edith Wharton that I've read, Ethan Frome being the first - and she did not disappoint. An intimate and critical exposé of society coupled with Edith Wharton's elegant prose secures this novel as one of the greatest pieces of American literature I've read yet.

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The first time I read that masterpiece of love and loss, and missed opportunities and chances; and backward glances and embraces, “The Age of Innocence”, I was in the 5th grade.

I had a penchant for costume dramas then, and
when the (now cheesy) trailer for the film starring Daniel Day Lewis, Winona Ryder and Michelle Pfeiffer had just been released, with its sumptuous and glittering costumes, production design and the gorgeous Pfeiffer and Ryder wearing respectively red and white gowns with roses?- I was in sheer heaven, and wanted to attempt to read the movie’s vision inside a novel.

The second time I read it was in high school grade English- Advanced Placement Language. At this time, I had been struck about how bittersweet and gorgeous Wharton’s writing was. It’s musical phrasings of balls, parties, and acts of decorum and ritual fascinated me. Old New York certainly was emotionally violent.

No wonder Martin Scorsese decided to make a film showcasing that emotionally violent world hidden and cloaked amongst the gorgeous hardware. Also the film was snubbed Oscar nominations for Best Picture, Director, and Actress for Michelle Pfeiffer.

Funnily enough she didn’t think this film to be one of her best- and I completely disagree. Being a shy, introverted person in interviews- this aloofness is perfect in characterizing Madame Olenska.

Newland Archer’s love for the unattainable Countess Olenska who almost gives up her freedom to be with him is a despairingly passionate tale that ends with bittersweet awesomeness. I felt most for her above all characters.

She’s different. She’s well-read, cultured, a woman of the world. Just because she’s stuck out, her indifference to rules makes her a harlot for the ages- especially for that of the Mingotts, the Van Der Luydens, and the Beauforts (who reveal themselves to be quite trashy- they have the audacity to have a ballroom!)

But it is her innocence and willingness to be open, pure, and romantic is what kills me. She was in love with a guy who wanted and wished to be like her- but because of what society’s dictated; chooses duty over true love. Sad, but true. I wanted to hate May Welland for taking Newland Archer away from his true love.

But in actuality, I do believe May was his actual true love. He was just like her- a creature of habit, not the free-spirited, seductive human being that Ellen Olenska was.

And it serves him right to be all alone at the very end of the novel, lonely, and perhaps remaining unloved except by his son Dallas who tried to get his dad to see his long lost love one last time.

Now I’ve finished this novel as an adult: it is certainly a slow-burner read for those who’ve experienced unrequited love, and those who love stories of missed chances.

Mostly I finish books I start, but when I first tried reading this novel twenty-five to thirty years ago, I don't think I made it past page five. I have a vague memory of seeing the film adaptation back in the 1990s, but it clearly didn't inspire me to return to the novel. So I'm not sure what made me decide to acquire and listen to the audiobook so many years later. However, I'm glad I did.

I knew that Wharton had written a novel critical of the world from which she sprang - late 19th century New York high society - but I hadn't expected such sharp irony. Nor had I expected the not infrequent touches of humour. Early on I was reminded of The Forsyte Saga, in which Galsworthy exposes the hypocrisy of the English upper middle class of the same period. But Galsworthy painted on a broader canvas than did Wharton, who focuses on her central protagonist Newland Archer's struggle between conforming to the expectations placed on him by his class and social position and his longing to follow his heart.

I really like Wharton's prose and her description of high society in 1870s New York is brilliantly evocative. I became less interested in Newland Archer's internal conflict as time went on and I was mildly irritated by the repeated references to characters' blushing, flushing and turning pale. (Was there really no other way Wharton could have indicated strong but restrained emotion?) But the poignancy of the ending won me over: it rang strong and true. The novel is an interesting snapshot of a particular place and at a particular time, but it still has something to say about the conflict between societal and family expectations and personal integrity and freedom. It made me want to read more of Edith Wharton's work.

There is nothing about the lives of the characters created by Edith Wharton in The Age of Innocence that I can claim to connect with. It is not a world that I am familiar with at all but one in which I am an outsider looking in. This world is Wharton’s world. She lived it and wrote about it and gave us a view into what the genteel of 1870’s New York society was like.

Newland Archer is to be married to May Welland. Their marriage is a perfect match between two society families. These young people have been brought up and conditioned to the conventions and proprieties of this way of life. They are expected to keep to the rules and live an almost false pretense of a marriage. May understands exactly how a wife is to behave and react in all types of situations. It is quite the masquerading life that attempts to exhibit a type of normalcy.

When a married cousin of May’s arrives in New York from Europe, Countess Olenska (Ellen) threatens to stir up the status quo. Ellen’s life in Europe has been unconventional and now she wishes to escape it and an abusive husband and start over. Her family’s attempt to restore Ellen’s status in society causes much “behind closed doors” discussion among the members of the genteel families. However, Ellen begins to open Newland’s eyes to just how silly and ridiculous his married life will be living under the societal norms and expectations. Ellen becomes a representation to Newland of a much more spontaneous and vivid existence to the one of high society. Ellen’s world is based on personal wants and preferences rather than obligations. He wonders how much of his societal duties he can bear and fantasizes of a life that is not constrained by these burdens.

Newland becomes caught between two very different ideals and is conflicted with his behavior and desires. His marriage to May is a responsibility that becomes constricting and he is caught between what he thinks is love and his obligations. Wharton effortlessly wrote this love triangle from a stance that she knew inside and out. She has given us a protagonist that leaves us wondering whether he really wants what he cannot have. Will he be happier with what he is denied or is acceptance of his reality his true happiness? When Newland gazes out of a window, he sees an opportunity to inhabit a world beyond what he knows as comfortable, but is he supposed to reach out and grasp hold of this illusion or not? And if he does, will he be disappointed?

This was the first book I've read from Edith Wharton and it was better than I was expecting. The images of 1870's New York are rich and chilling and it's central theme so relevant and relatable.

Newland Archer aches with the constraints of his time and the absurdity and hypocrisy of the society in which he lives. He longs to break free and yet ultimately lives a life of quiet remorse. It struck me just how little has changed in that regard. Most people still fall into a conventional life simply because it doesn't occur to them not to. You know that image of standing in the middle of the crowded room screaming at the top of your lungs and no one even looks up? That's Newland Archer. That's a lot of people; the sleepwalking majority. He shivered a little, remembering some of the new ideas in his scientific books, and the much cited instance of the Kentucky cave-fish, which had ceased to develop eyes because they had no use for them. What if, when he had bidden May Welland to open hers, they could only look out blankly at blankness?

And by gosh this book is funny. It was one of the great livery-stableman's most masterly intuitions to have discovered that Americans want to get away from amusement even more quickly than they want to get to it. Ever been stuck in a mob trying to exit a movie theater, or worse, a plane?

And oh, the maddening denial, one of my favorite themes in books. The frantic desperate clinging to airs. It did not hurt him half as much to tell May an untruth as to see her trying to pretend that she had not detected him.

And love. Love. That once in a lifetime but we couldn't be together because of circumstances love. Each time you happen to me all over again.

The ending just about killed me. Do it, do it, is he going to do it?!.... And yet it was perfect.

This is my second Wharton, and it only deepens my love for her writing. She skillfully places her characters in their moral dilemmas in such a way that you are sucked into their world and you spend an inordinate amount of time after you finish the book, rehashing their actions and decisions, mentally debating their choices and evaluating what your own would have been. When you read the last words of a Wharton novel and close the book, you are NOT finished with the story, and I love that. Lily Bart remained my mental companion long after I finished The House of Mirth, and I’m still preoccupied with Newland Archer and Madame Olenska.

Newland Archer seems to be, at the beginning, the typical fashionable New Yorker. Wharton makes Archer’s reverence for and adherence to “the code” for a young man of 1870’s New York very clear. Everything in his life seems to be perfectly on track. He’s comfortably ensconced in the privileged position his name provides for him in the upper echelon of society, he is a partner in a respected law firm, and he has won the affections of well-bred young woman whom many describe as “the handsomest woman in New York,” and they are about to announce their engagement. As we all know, such perfection in circumstances means it is time for the proverbial fly to land in the ointment, and of course, it does. The fly, in this instance, is in the pleasing shape of Madame Ellen Olenska, cousin to Newland’s new fiancée. Ellen is married to a Polish count, and has taken the scandalous step of leaving her husband and fleeing to her family. As if that is not shocking enough, her escape was aided by her husband’s (male) secretary, in whose charge she remained for an unseemly period of time.

At first, Ellen’s appearance is merely an annoyance to Newland. Her presence has caused talk and an uncomfortable amount of attention to his new fiancée’s family, and he resents this. Her mannerisms are foreign, and she seems to have forgotten the basic tenets that guide behavior in New York society. Gradually, though, the more Newland is around her, the more he sees that she is a unique, fascinating woman. Conversely, the more unique and fascinating he finds Ellen, the more bland, conventional, and uninteresting he finds May, his fiancée.

Newland’s position is truly unenviable. At that time, for a man to jilt a woman was considered to be conduct of the most reprehensible for a gentleman, and he would have been completely disgraced. May, too, would have suffered most unfairly from this event. Even though she would have been the innocent victim, it would attach a notoriety to her name that she would probably never have completely escaped. Even as he agonizes over his situation, he knows that breaking his engagement is an extreme step that will result in heartbreak and shame for both families. What good would it do anyway? Ellen is still married, thanks to Newland’s legal advice to her.

I think Wharton’s novel, while told from the viewpoint of a male, is a critique of woman’s roles in society. Most of the women in the book are completely defined by the men in their lives, and have completely submerged their own identities into those of their husbands, sublimating their own needs and desires to accommodate those of their husbands. Ellen is different from these women; she has taken her fate into her own hands and disregarded her husband’s wishes, but she pays a price for her actions. She is regarded rather indulgently at first, as though she is a child having a tantrum, but when she continues to refuse to return to him or compromise with him, when she continues to do what SHE wishes to do, even her own family washes their hands of her.

Although Wharton’s characters consider themselves to be the cream of a sophisticated and evolved society, I found it interesting that she emphasizes biology so often. On the second page of the story she compares Newland’s following the rule for late arrival at the opera “as important in Newland Archer’s New York as the inscrutable totem terrors that had ruled the destinies of his forefathers thousands of years ago,” (6). She frequently uses the words “tribe”, “clan,” and “ancestors” in describing their families and alliances. To me, and maybe it is just me, these words, while meaning family, also have a more primitive connotation, hearkening back to less civilized times. It just seemed to me to be a reminder that, despite the elegant fashions, luxurious mansions, and burgeoning technology of the modern era, these people are, just like their less civilized ancestors, ruled quite often by their instincts and biological urges. May, for example, is presented as innocent and sweet, deceit and subterfuge completely foreign to her nature. Newland even thinks that, if he were to confess his love for Ellen to her, that she might sacrifice herself on the altar of his happiness. Somehow, artless May ends up effectively quashing Newland’s plans to be with Ellen without ever betraying any knowledge of them. She decides, impulsively, to confide in Ellen that she is pregnant, even though she’s not really sure she is. Now was this cold-blooded manipulation on May’s part, or a cunning born of instinct—the preservation of her own family? I’m not sure.

The ending is ambiguous, and you are left to ponder Newland’s final choice. I think, in the end, he felt that being with Ellen was an opportunity lost. When they first met and felt that initial draw to each other, they were different people: young, still discovering themselves, both at crossroads in their lives. At this point, though, I think that he feels that the roads down which fate has led them have diverged too widely, and that these roads have made them into different people. Newland’s roots are firmly dug into the New England soil now: this is his home, these are his people. When Madame Olenska entered his life as a young man, the possibility of becoming a different man than the one he was raised to be presented itself. Fate ultimately denied him that opportunity, and Newland accepted his destiny. Now he has spent his life among the traditional values of New York society, while Ellen has lived most of her life among the more cosmopolitan free-thinkers in Europe. What are they to do? Is he to leave his home, his children, his social circle, and move to Paris with Ellen and her bohemian group of friends, or is she to give up the freedom and intellectual stimulation of these people to move to New York and drink tea and discuss fashion and the latest gossip with the society matrons there? I think Newland feels he could have taken this drastic step as a younger man, but not now. And who is Ellen now, after all? I think, in his mind, she has become more of a symbol than a real person. “When he thought of Ellen Olenska it was abstractly, serenely, as one might think of some imaginary beloved in a book or a picture: she had become the composite vision of all that he had missed,” (281). Chances are, after all this time, that the woman would not be able to measure up to what her memory represents to him, and he knows this. I think this is why he chooses to walk away. I do wish he had decided differently, though.

Coincidentally, as I was reading this, we went to a museum exhibit that included gowns by Worth from the 1860’s-1870’s period. They were absolutely gorgeous and I greatly enjoyed imagining Ellen and May wearing them in the elegant settings of the opera box and the Beauforts’ ballroom. They made a little piece of me wish we could still dress with that flair—until I imagined being corseted and petticoated out the wazoo in the Houston heat. Nope! I’ll stick with my jeans and t-shirts, thank you!