The House of Mirth

Edith Wharton's classic novel, The House of Mirth, is a brillaint exposé of the pretense and greed of fashionable New York Society. In The House of Mirth, which helped to establish Edith Wharton’s literary reputation, she honed her acerbic styl ... Read more

Edith Wharton's classic novel, The House of Mirth, is a brillaint exposé of the pretense and greed of fashionable New York Society. In The House of Mirth, which helped to establish Edith Wharton’s literary reputation, she honed her acerbic style and discovered her defining subject: the fashionable New York society in which she had been raised and that held the power to debase both people and ideals. In this devastatingly accurate and finely wrought tale, Lily Bart, the poor relation of a wealthy woman, is beautiful, intelligent, and hopelessly addicted to the moneyed world of luxury and grace. But her good taste and moral sensibility render her unfit for survival in a vulgar society whose glittering social edifice is based on a foundation of pure greed. A brilliant portrayal of both human frailty and nobility, and a bitter attack on false social values, The House of Mirth has been hailed by Louis Auchincloss as “uniquely authentic among American novels of manners.” The novel has two cinematic adaptations, the most recent and more popular being the 2000 drama film written and directed by Terence Davies starring Gillian Anderson as Lily Bart. The other being the 1918 American silent melodrama film directed by French film director Albert Capellani, starring Katherine Harris Barrymore as Lily Bart. Less