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Analysis Of The Age Of Innocence By Edith Wharton

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The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton is widely considered to be a masterpiece, both at the time it was originally published, and now. However, people’s views and comments on the work became drastically different over time. When the novel won the Pulitzer Prize in 1921, the judging committee stated that it presented “the wholesome atmosphere of American life and the highest standard of American manners and manhood.” (McCrum) On the contrary, today, in many people’s opinions, this novel became an ironic criticism on the old American society and culture.
It is easy for us to see the wrong things in that old New York as presented in the story: the double standard for women, the hypocrisy that infects almost the entire upper-class society, and …show more content…

As early as in 1905, an actor named Clara Bow had already risen to fame as a flapper, and it didn’t take long before many other women start to imitate her styles. (Encyclopedia.com) Articles which remarked flappers positively also started to appear as of 1919. (Chronicling America) Therefore, it is reasonable to include the cultural changes and the new values represented by the Flappers as an important piece of background information when evaluating Wharton’s …show more content…

However, that situation doesn’t last forever. As time passes, generation iterates, people’s values change as well. Although the society doesn’t grant Olenska a medal, nor any form of recognition for her forward-thinking, the social norms, the popular ideals do change to a set of beliefs similar to those once held by Olenska. By the end of the story, the effects of those social changes are so drastically apparent that, when Archer’s eldest son, Dallas marries Fanny Beaufort, or “a Beaufort 's bastard,” as Lawrence Lefferts would call her, gives a second guessing to this marriage with a girl from a once infamous household. (Wharton,

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Innocence is the idea of being blameless and free from any wrongs because one devoid in making any decisions. However, at times those who are innocent cause frenzy and disruptions in a family. Alden Nowlan’s, The Fall of a City, portrays how Teddy, an eleven year old boy, full of imagination in his own little world is ridiculed by his aunt and uncle whom believe that he is up to something in the attic. Subsequently, it is accentuated that his imagination blinds him from realizing the reality that his imaginations are illusions. Throughout this short story, Nowlan demonstrates how naivety and innocence blinds one from realizing the truth by juxtaposing the two settings and emphasizing on the conflicts.

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With the right to vote, consumer based culture, leisure time, and modernism, women who followed these new practices and ideals created the flapper image of the roaring twenties we know today. In Fitzgerald’s story he describes the girls almost wanting to be flappers to me it seems as if in almost all of Fitzgerald’s books he has a girl who is the opposite of what her society wants her to be like and is leaning towards the lifestyle of a flapper girl it's like they are all the same person or have many of the same characteristic in “ The Great Gatsby” which is one of my favorite books, Jordan Baker is a golfer who represents what the new woman is which is cynical,boyish, and self centered. She kinda reminds me of how Beatrice and Marjorie are at the end. They had almost every iconic element of a flapper besides the bobbed hair,but they loved to party at the end , they dance to jazz music, was cut-in every few feet on the dance floor, was always wearing the latest fashions, and was all over casual dating. With this new flashy and flirtatious attitude and charm that young women

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In the nineteenth century, woman had no power over men in society. They were limited in their freedom, as their lives were controlled by their husbands. Some women did not mind this lifestyle, and remained obedient, while some rebelled and demanded their rights. “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, are short stories that exposes the lifestyle women lived in the nineteenth century. The protagonists from both stories, Jane and Georgiana, similarly lived a male dominated lifestyle.

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(Sauro 1) Flappers were typically young, urban, middle-classed women. Clara Bow was one of the women who popularized the flapper look, and acts. Clara bow also cultivated the devil-may-care attitude and fashion. Bow was referred to as the scarlet that had “it.”

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After the 19th amendment was passed, giving women the right to vote, woman began leaving behind their traditional roles and taking on new responsibilities, fashion trends and claiming their independence.(Doc 5.The New Woman). The younger generation of ladies in the 1920s surfaced into what is know as a flapper. Flappers listened to jazz music, embraced risqué fashion trends, and took part in bold behavior, which challenged their stereotype and led to more tension. The need breed of woman wanted to be accepted by the older generation, who often judged and disagreed with their new lifestyle. (doc 6.

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In Edith Wharton’s most remarkable novel, Ethan Frome, the main character, Ethan Frome, is in love with a prohibited woman… his wife's cousin. His wife, Zeena, is a sick woman who has a villainous essence to her and an irrevocable hold on Ethan. Mattie Silver is Zeena’s cousin and the woman Ethan is infatuated with. Through Ethan’s eyes, Mattie is described as youthful, attractive, and graceful basically everything Zeena isn’t.

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Imagery and Symbolism Edith Wharton creates the novel with a high percentage of imagery and symbolism in one. Some ways she combines both imagery and symbolism together is by a flower. Wharton states, “He had never seen any as sun-golden before, and his first impulse was to send them to May instead of the lilies. But they did not look like her - there was something too rich, too strong, in their fiery beauty”(Wharton).

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One of the biggest factors that caused the roles of women in the united States to change during the 1920’s was the work they did during World War I. While the men were serving overseas, the women stepped into the men’s jobs and made up the majority of the labor force at that time. This allowed women the chance to show that they can do some of the same jobs that men could do. After the war, the number of women in the workforce increased by twenty-five percent. This opened up more opportunities all over the country to earn their place in providing for their families. Another thing that changed for women, during the 1920’s was “flappers”.

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When viewing a situation from an outside perspective, it is simple to choose the best action but when people are put in a fearful position, the judgment and emotion become dispersed. Arthur Miller gives readers insight throughout the novel, The Crucible in the early 1900s where the characters in the story are put through the Salem Witch Trials. In the play, The Crucible, a village becomes involved in a witch hunt, where people are in continuous fear the whole time because of the accusations of witchcraft and the role of McCarthyism and hysteria. During The Crucible the characters show suspicious behavior, injustice, distrust, betrayal, fear of being accused, how people are easily influenced by others, and baseless accusations which are all

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As a text seemingly disparate from Edith Wharton’s other novels, scholarship surrounding Summer has tended to focus on gender and power constructions between Mr. Royall and Charity Royall. Recent scholarship, however, has focused on the social and cultural aspects of Summer. Elizabeth Ammons has taken a stark stance, problematizing Wharton’s portrayals of race by reifying normative racial constructions of the early twentieth century (68). Anne MacMaster notes the centrality of racial representations, though they appear to be marginal concerns to the plotline, in Wharton’s other work, The Age of Innocence.

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The image of the flapper was used in magazines and advertising and lead to the influence of mass consumer culture and media. This new image of the flapper “encouraged both the consumption of new products and new patterns of consumption and provided women with accessible routes to engage with modernity.” Since women started to gain rights such as voting and opportunity to gain jobs, women started to gain a sense of freedom and started to mix in with the new modern world they were entering in. As stated before, technology started to rise, and companies wanted to sell these new products. So, companies started to aim towards women in

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One of the questions I would like to ask my group is, To what extent is the era of Old New York an "Age of Innocence"? The first chapters try to immerse the reader into the society by using Newland Archer as the narrator, Edith Wharton brings attention to the fact that unless you are part of the society you would not understand the complexity in which the characters live their life in. Wharton also uses an omniscient narration to describe many of the details of setting, as well as the personal histories and physical appearances of several characters. Wharton creates a focus on each female through the descriptions and images she has created for each of them. Her intention I would assume is to give meaning to her female characters, to make

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Innocence is something that can only be lost once. Within both The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley there are various characters that lose their innocence in very dramatic ways. A character can lose their innocence due to the death of someone else. They can also lose their innocence by just being looked at from a different perspective by others, this can be seen through the characters Bernard and Rachel. When a person is introduced to something new it can also affect their innocence.

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