(Social) Climate Change

In Edith Wharton’s, The Age of Innocence, the beginning chapters of the story have successfully pulled me in. While reading this novel it has begun to stir thoughts in my mind about the ay that individuals conform to society and what is calls “normal” so quickly. In the book the main character, Newland Archer, meets Ellen, his fiancees cousin. With Ellen playing the role of the disgraced family member, her pretense invokes new thoughts on society by Archer. This idea of the issue with conformity begins to play a large role in the conversations between the two and in the actions by Archer. These conversations hold a major basis off of the upper class New York society that they live in. The questions that Archer begins to think about travel over to the reader as well. For me, the ideas brought up in the novel make me think about my own actions and what holds the most influence over them.

Wharton’s choice of point of view plays an integral part in the formation of this existential question. Through the use of Newland Archer’s point of view we are able to see he parts of affluent New York society and the social norms and constructs that the characters in the book must follow. He questions this and brings these issues to the forefront of the novel. If he book was written in any of the other main characters point of view it would not be as effective. Ellen would be too much of an outcast with a biased opinion against her society and his fiancee May would be too deep in to the society and ultimately hold a bias towards it. This use of point of view allows for the reader to get a view of their society through the lens of a man that is simply questioning the society that he was raised in. In addition, his status play a large part in the readers insight to the specifics of the pre 20th century New York that they live in and question.

One Reply to “(Social) Climate Change”

  1. Thank you for sharing, Sophia. What I find most interesting about this book is the characters are wealthy and powerful – yet the reader feels sorry for them. How is that? What does Wharton do to convey the reader’s sense of sorrow for these characters that live in a constant state of fear despite their circumstance?

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