House of Mirth (Barnes & Noble Classics - Edith Wharton [198]
Ammons, Elizabeth. Edith Wharton’s Argument with America. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1980, pp. 25-42. Section cited emphasizes Wharton’s role as woman writer and the economic basis of the novel.
Ammons, Elizabeth, ed. The House of Mirth: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds, and Contexts Criticism. New York: Norton, 1990. Helpful background essays, boring reviews of 1905, and modern criticism by Millicent Bell, Louis Auchincloss, Cynthia Wolff, R. W. B. Lewis, Elizabeth Ammons, and Elaine Showalter.
Brookner, Anita. Introduction to The House of Mirth. New York: Scribner’s, 1987, pp. 7-14. Sensitive reading of novel as “an implacable account of how things go wrong, and what is worse, how nearly they could have gone right.”
Fryer, Judith. “Reading Mrs. Lloyd.” In Edith Wharton: New Critical Essays, edited by Alfred Bendixen and Annette Zilversmit. New York: Garland, 1992, pp. 27-55. Excellent analysis of the role of Reynolds’ portrait in the tableaux vivants.
Gordon, Mary. Introduction to The House of Mirth. New York: Vintage Books/Library of America, 1990, pp. xi—xviii. Valuable essay, by an important contemporary novelist, on the economic, social, and sexual contradictions in Lily’s character.
Hardwick, Elizabeth. Introduction to The House of Mirth. New York: Modern Library, 1999, pp. xi-xx. Emphasizes the craftsmanship, characterization, and portrayal of the social history of New York.
Howard, Maureen. “The House of Mirth: The Bachelor and the Baby.” In The Cambridge Companion to Edith Wharton, edited by Millicent Bell. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. 137-156. Describes the themes of concealment and revelation, and what must be discovered by the characters.
Howe, Irving. “Introduction: The Achievement of Edith Wharton” and “A Reading of The House of Mirth.” In Edith Wharton: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1962, pp. 1-18, 119-129. Valuable account, by a major critic, of the style, tone, and structure. This volume also includes excellent essays by Edmund Wilson, Louis Auchincloss, Percy Lubbock, Criticism E. K. Brown, Q. D. Leavis, Alfred Kazin, Diana Trilling, Blake Nevius, Lionel Trilling, Vernon Parrington, and Louis Coxe.
Knights, Pamela. Introduction to The House of Mirth. New York: Everyman, 1991, pp. ix-xxxiii. Interesting essay, by an English academic, on the background, characters, and voices.
Mansfield, Katherine. “The Age of Innocence.” In Novels and Novelists. 1930. Reprint: Boston: Beacon, 1959, pp. 307-308. Reveals defects in Wharton’s portrayal of character.
McDowell, Margaret. Edith Wharton. Revised edition. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1991, pp. 1-29. Convincing close reading with emphasis on character and themes.
Nevius, Blake. Edith Wharton: A Study of Her Fiction. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1953, pp. 53-77. Section cited emphasizes conflict between individual freedom and social responsibility.
Poirier, Richard. “Edith Wharton’s The House of Mirth.” In A World Elsewhere: The Place of Style in American Literature. 1966. Reprint: Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1985, pp. 219-235. On style and portrayal of society; makes some interesting comparisons with George Eliot.
Rideout, Walter. “Edith Wharton’s The House of Mirth.” In Twelve Original Essays on Great American Novels, edited by Charles Shapiro. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1958, pp. 148-176. Illuminating discussion of how design and detail contribute to meaning.
Showalter, Elaine, “The Death of the Lady (Novelist): Wharton’s The House of Mirth,” Representations, 9 (Winter 1985), pp. 133-149. Reprinted in Edith Wharton: New Critical Essays, edited by Alfred Bendixen. New York: Garland, 1992, pp. 3-26. Suggests that Wharton achieved artistic liberation while portraying Lily’s entrapment and defeat.
Singley, Carol, ed. A Historical Guide to Edith Wharton. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Provides historical contexts for the life and work.
Supple, Barry, “A Business Elite: German-Jewish Financiers in Nineteenth-Century New York,” Business History