Wharton v. James's female characters

7/29/2019 Wharton v. James's female characters

1/16

Cornered and Guilty:

Inhibitions in Jamess Washington Square and Whartons The Age of Innocence

Essay

Jan Zasadil

American Literature II

January 8, 2010

Wordcount: 5876

Submitted to: doc. Justin Quinn


2/16

Almost forty years divide the issue dates of Jamess Washington Square and Whartons The

Age of Innocence. The phrase age of innocence has become a term denoting the period leading

towards the Gilded Age. Wharton had for a long time have to suffer from being considered as

excessively like James in her early work, and even being accused of having studied Henry James

very closely repeating some of his worst faults of style with a skill that after a time becomes

very amusing.1It is along these lines traceable in the lives and relationship of these two novelists

that we may consider their works mutually inhibiting to some degree. Their time and professional

relationship entail questions of social conventions, manners and gender while they undertake to

question the manners and conventions of their ancestors in their novels.

In the present reading of The Age of Innocence and Washington Square, I intend to

concentrate on the theme of social inhibition and sense of guilt in the New York society described in

these two novels. Social inhibitions shall be observed here as important force driving forth the

characters of Jamess and Whartons novels, as it creates a very specific sense of guilt in the age of

innocence. To begin with, there is a remarkable set of gender inhibitions established for the contact

situations which Whartons narrator seems to be commenting upon more than Jamess. On a much

more general level, we may observe a suppressed complaint of both central characters of the two

novels, Newland Archer in The Age of Innocence and Catherine Sloper in Washington Square,

namely their inhibition in leading their lives as they see fit. They are both too tightly knit together

with their social environment to disrupt it by words, let alone actions. Their inhibitions originate in

their overall breeding and shy publicity (to paraphrase an observation Wharton makes through the

character of Count Olenska). Finally, it has become quite obvious from the questions raised and will

hopefully become much clearer further on that there is a great portion of childlikeness or even

childishness involved in the behavior of both ordinary members and leaders of the societies in

Jamess and Whartons novels. This is in my opinion connected to the split of the characters guilt

into two areas of debt, one being the social code and the other ones self. As the two areas seem to

1Millicent Bell, Edith Wharton and Henry James: The Literary Relation, PMLA, Vol. 74, No. 5 (Dec., 1959), pp.

619-637, Modern Language Association at Jstor, 04/12/2009 06:25 .


3/16

mutually contradict one another in most regards, the characters need to always act inauthentically in

one way or the other: either in childlike, obeying compliance with or in childlike, selfish defiance

of the social inhibitions. Sadly, these debts are paid and the clash between the code and self is

resolved at the expense of the characters closest relationships.

Talking gender in the 19th century New York still entails separating the sexes in most

respects from one another; that is definitely in public and very much in private and in the mind.

Starting with the most prominent because most demanded code of the New York societies, we may

observe the views on (pre)marital chastity as represented in the novels. Washington Square

represents a more Victorian division of sexes in these terms, as slightly hinted in the information

about Morris Townsend provided to Dr. Sloper by Mrs. Almond: Mr. Townsend travelled all over

the world, lived abroad, amused himself.2 [Italics added] On the other hand, Catherine Sloper

never even thinks of the other sex sensuously. This is however not caused by the social demand for

chastity or by upbringing; it is Catherines nature. [O]ddly enough, in spite of her taste for fine

clothes, she had not a grain of coquetry, and her anxiety when she put them on was as to whether

they, and not she, would look well.3Without a proper counterpart in the form of Ms. Slopers being

forbidden to amuse herself, Mr. Townsends allowing himself to be amusedcannot be considered a

socialprivilege of gender. It is true, however, that James rather avoids genderizing his novel this

way, as he avoids expressed sensuality in general, and it is sure that such social code existed in New

York society. What is, nevertheless, only proved by the example of Washington Square, is the

gender-based division of economic means: Mr. Townsend

inherited a small property and [...] he spent it all in a few years. He

travelled all over the world, lived abroad, amused himself. ...it was a kind

of system, a theory he had. He has lately come back to America, with the

intention [...] of beginning life in earnest.4

In the novel, such behavior is tolerated in a young man although it does not seem to recommend

him as a responsible individual. In a young lady, this behavior is virtually unimaginable, both

2 Henry James, Washington Square, 94.3 Henry James, Washington Square, 72.4 Henry James, Washington Square, 94.


4/16

economically and socially. This is why Catherine only travels with her father.

However, the economic responsibility, at least in Whartons interpretation, is not the most

important factor in premarital chastity: What could he and she really know of each other, since it

was his duty, as a decent fellow, to conceal his past from her, and hers, as a marriageable girl, to

have no past to conceal? Marriageable is a term only applied to women in both novels.

Nevertheless, we find that the English notion of double standard in terms of (pre)marital chastity is

altered in The Age of Innocence; it finds some correction in the liberal mind of the protagonist who

could not deplore (as Thackeray's heroes so often exasperated him by doing)

that he had not a blank page to offer his bride in exchange for the

unblemished one she was to give to him. He could not get away from the

fact that if he had been brought up as she had they would have been no morefit to find their way about than the Babes in the Wood; nor could he, for all

his anxious cogitations, see any honest reason (any, that is, unconnected

with his own momentary pleasure, and the passion of masculine vanity) why

his bride should not have been allowed the same freedom of experience as

himself.5

Gender equality in terms of (pre)marital chastity is still a matter of individual minds. What seems to

lurk from Newlands reasoning is the uselessness of being innocent. We learn that Newland has had

an affair with a married woman without being stigmatized in any way and he himself considers it an

experience that prepared him for life better than chastity would. Yet, in all of the society who think

the same Newland does, innocence remains the code and guilt cannot be shaken off. Newland could

not deplore his affair although he was supposed to, yet he cannot avoid considering the possibility

of being guilty in his cogitations.

What is even more remarkable in the New York society is the mechanism and procedure that

go into effect when May suspects her husband of having an affair with Countess Olenska. Wharton

reports that when Newland watched the farewell party for Countess Olenska,

it came over him, in a vast flash made up of many broken gleams, that to all

of them he and Madame Olenska were lovers.... He guessed himself to have

been, for months, the centre of countless silently observing eyes and

patiently listening ears; he understood that, by means as yet unknown to

him, the separation between himself and the partner of his guilt had been

achieved, and that now the whole tribe had rallied about his wife on the tacitassumption that nobody knew anything, or had ever imagined anything, and

5 Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence. (London: Penguine Books, 1996), 44.


5/16

that the occasion of the entertainment was simply Mays natural desire to

take an affectionate leave of her friend and cousin.6

The guilt of the one is felt as something unpleasant for the rest, which is not to be born with in the

age of innocence. The term tribe indicates ancient, almost unconscious forces at work.

Comparing this excerpt with the previous one, we can see that guilt in The Age of Innocence is

rather a community experience.

In terms of gender distinctions, again, there is no counterpart to reflect the differences no

similar situation with Newland being the one cheated on. This fact alone seems to be representative

of the gender distinction on its own; since in The Age of Innocence, at least two other men who are

frequently having affairs are mentioned, it is generally speaking rather the taboo veiling this social

group than a lack of promiscuous behavior that causes Wharton to omit promiscuous women who

would be the ones switching sexual partners. Once again, economics may answer the question why

it is promiscuous women, not men, who are banished from the mind of the public: even a

promiscuous man could in some ways secure honorability by virtue of his socio-economic

contribution. The lack of such opportunity made all promiscuous women to be partly viewed as

prostitutes who attract the attention of men of power with the expectations of social and economical

favors. Drawing our attention back to The Age of Innocence, we are left with the question whether

or not Countess Olenska, as Newlands suspected lover, could have been considered as such by the

public too. Already stigmatized by her wish to divorce from her Polish husband, Countess Olenska

is both the only example of an independent woman and a rather less wealthy one.

Conversely, Catherine in Washington Square seems to be a perfect example of a chaste

young lady of marriageable properties andpossessions. Continuing the conversation between Dr.

Sloper and Mrs. Almond, we can see how brutally frank could the closest family be in defining a

young ladys situation as portrayed by James:

Is he in earnest about Catherine, then?

I don't see why you should be incredulous, said Mrs. Almond. It seems

to me that you have never done Catherine justice. You must remember thatshe has the prospect of thirty thousand a year. The Doctor looked at his

6 Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence. (London: Penguine Books, 1996), 338.


6/16

sister a moment, and then, with the slightest touch of bitterness: You at

least appreciate her, he said.

Mrs. Almond blushed.

I don't mean that is her only merit; I simply mean that it is a great one.

A great many young men think so; and you appear to me never to have been

properly aware of that. You have always had a little way of alluding to her

as an unmarriageable girl.My allusions are as kind as yours, Elizabeth, said the Doctor frankly. How

many suitors has Catherine had, with all her expectations--how much

attention has she ever received? Catherine is not unmarriageable, but she is

absolutely unattractive.7

It is especially in Washington Square that women are rather considered as commodity and displayed

as such. In The Age of Innocence, this view is both relieved and confirmed by the character of

Countess Olenska as a considerably independent woman who, however, would not be socially

accepted if she divorced. As we can see, connecting a womans worth with her heritage is a reason

to blush and much guilt is felt by the family members if they do so. It is again a rather public sort of

guilty feelings as Mrs. Almond is quite convinced of what she says about Catherine and it is not

even Dr.Slopers presence alone but his comment that makes her blush. Furthermore, Mrs. Almond

continues pursuing the same ideas she had blushed to have been caught expressing. In Dr. Sloper,

there is virtually no room for guilt whatsoever: his opinion about Catherines marriageability is

cruelly clear.

It is certainly possible to find much more material for a discussion of gender in the novels

and it is a part of the social inhibitions to be dealt with in this paper, however there is also a danger

unforeseen by e.g. Evelyn Fracasso in her The Transparent Eyes of May Welland in Wharton's The

AgeofInnocence of taking sides, as it were. In her short essay, Fracasso traces what she seems to

consider Whartons way of promoting the fairer sexs inner strength and independence.

Although Wharton has described Mays eyes thus far as bright, light,

limpid, too-clear, and only once as distant and serious, now for the first

time, she categorizes them as transparent, a designation alerting the reader

to heed the deep-seated strength and tenacity of purpose that will be more

openly demonstrated by May and reflected in her most prominent physical

feature.8

7 Henry James, Washington Square, 94.8 Evelyn Fracasso, The Transparent Eyes of May Welland in Wharton's "The Age of Innocence", Modern Language

Studies, Vol. 21, No. 4 (Autumn, 1991), pp. 43-48, Modern Language Studies at Jstor, 04/12/2009 06:23.


7/16

Fracasso uses these synonymous adjectives to draw conclusions about May Wellands qualities and

thinks way more into her matter than she draws from it. For instance, in the scene at St. Augustine

where Newland urges May to hasten and marry before lent, Mays hitherto blank, unclouded,

limpid eyes suddenly become eyes of such despairing clearness9

as May proposes that Newland

should rather return to his former mistress if he would advance their wedding-day only to escape

feelings for someone else. For Fracasso, this testifies to Mays unexpected boldness and insight.

When assured by Newland that there is no other woman in his life, May bursts into tears of

happiness, and, according to Fracasso, Archer erroneously assumes that [she] has suddenly faded

away and been replaced by the helpless and timorous girl he had previously judged her to be. 10

Obviously, the argument can be developed in the opposite direction using the same examples

Fracasso does for instance, the emergence of clear, determined look from limpid eyes may imply

affectation as well as sincerely expressed whish. This version can even be supported by Fracassos

own excerpt from Mayssermon-like speech that accompanies the described look: I couldn't have

my happiness made out of a wrong an unfairness to somebody else. And I want to believe that it

would be the same with you. What sort of a life could we build on such foundations?11

In Washington Square, there is much more gender polarity employed. However, most of it is closely connected with the economical distribution at the time

and with the very unusual father-daughter relationship. In The Age of Innocence, characters indigenous to the social code, as well as those that appear to struggle with the

inhibitions and unsettle the society, may be found across gender boundaries. On the one hand, there are the van der Luydens, a married couple who keep the social standards

of the New York cream, or Mrs. Manson Mingott whose recklessness in many respects does not prevent her from conformity in most decisive matters: her house is outside

the fashionable circle, but her opinions are intact by the moving out. On the other hand, there are, for instance, Countess Olenska and Newland with their contentless bonds

to spouses, both intelligent and bold enough to see and want to resolve their situations and both too considerate to do so at the expense of their social circle, or Julius

Beaufort and Mrs. Struthers, both well off not by virtue of heritage but their own endeavors, who are alien to the New York high society but inexcludable from it and who

care little for its old ways. In short, it is clear that gender distinctions are important in displaying the social inhibitions dealt with in these two novels, however it is not the

goal of neither James nor Wharton to emphasize the social inhibitions connected with gender.

Both sexes seem to have the same difficulty to live life as they see fit. Having made a probe

9 Evelyn Fracasso, The Transparent Eyes of May Welland in Wharton's "The Age of Innocence".10 Evelyn Fracasso, The Transparent Eyes of May Welland in Wharton's "The Age of Innocence".11 Evelyn Fracasso, The Transparent Eyes of May Welland in Wharton's "The Age of Innocence".


8/16

into the gender issues, it is very important at this point to note the intertwined effects and causes of

other inhibitions as portrayed in Jamess and Whartons novels. In the beginning, I have mentioned

upbringing and parenting, the shy publicity, and childlikeness of the characters. These features

bring about issues of ineffective rite of passage, and they seem to represent one quality that has

been referred to as a specific kind of innocence. We may observe the individual features to see

what the function of innocence was and guilt is in the authors works.

Social inhibitions are a means of upbringing which certainly is of the highest interest to all

societies, however some social strata use more complicated systems of social inhibitions than others

and their insistence on conventions is, therefore, of higher import. This is quite often shown in

Washington Square and mentioned by both the narrator and the characters in TheAge of Innocence.

For instance,

Oh, well-- said Archer with happy indifference. Nothing about his

betrothed pleased him more than her resolute determination to carry to its

utmost limit that ritual of ignoring the unpleasant in which they had both

been brought up.12

Their upbringing is what ultimately holds the marriage of the Newland Archers together. When

initially denied the advancement of their wedding at St. Augustine, Newland decides to break up

with May, but he does not carry out his decision after receiving her letter about her parents consent

later on. Newland seems to have no reason for doing this but not to disrupt the audience of his

social environment to avoid the unpleasant, for that is how he had been brought up. The

characters upbringing brings about their inability to formulate any wish or complaint with

resolution.

In case of Dr.Sloper and Catherine, upbringing takes on very peculiar countenance. Robert

Emmet Long notices the remarkable resemblance of Jamess Dr.Sloper and Hawthornes

Rappaccini. It is perhaps significant that James completed his critical biography, Hawthorne, in

1879, just before he began to write WashingtonSquare.13 In Washington Square, we may see the

12 Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence. (London: Penguine Books, 1996), 23.13 Robert Emmet Long, James's Washington Square: The Hawthorne Relation, The New England Quarterly, Vol. 46,

No. 4 (Dec., 1973), pp. 573-590, The New England Quarterly, Inc. at Jstor. 04/12/2009 06:40.


9/16

forces of socio-economical inhibition embodied in the figure of Dr. Sloper, as he is the one who

makes clear Catherines limitations in terms of intellect and appearance and who does not deny that

her heritage may be the most attractive thing about her. The Hawthornian side of Dr. Sloper is partly

apparent in the way he isolates his daughter from the rest of the world by his possessive

protectiveness.

You have not dismissed him, then. ...

No, said Catherine; I have asked him--asked him to wait.

Her father sat looking at her, and she was afraid he was going to break

out into wrath; his eyes were so fine and cold.

You are a dear, faithful child, he said at last. Come here to your

father. And he got up, holding out his hands toward her.

The words were a surprise, and they gave her an exquisite joy. She went

to him, and he put his arm round her tenderly, soothingly; and then he kissedher. After this he said:

Do you wish to make me very happy?

I should like to--but I am afraid I can't, Catherine answered.

You can if you will. It all depends on your will.

Is it to give him up? said Catherine.

Yes, it is to give him up.

And he held her still, with the same tenderness, looking into her face and

resting his eyes on her averted eyes. There was a long silence; she wished he

would release her.14

Even more, Rappaccini is mirrored in Dr. Sloper in his curious, almost scientific observations on

Catherines intellectual development and behavior:

Say it amuses you outright! I don't see why it should be such a joke that

your daughter adores you.

It is the point where the adoration stops that I find it interesting to fix.

It stops where the other sentiment begins.

Not at all--that would be simple enough. The two things are extremely

mixed up, and the mixture is extremely odd. It will produce some third

element, and that's what I am waiting to see. I wait with suspense--withpositive excitement; and that is a sort of emotion that I didn't suppose

Catherine would ever provide for me. I am really very much obliged to

her.15

As we can see, social inhibitions always complementarily entail a sense of parenting and

beingparented; thanks to the general validity of the conventions, roles of parental authorities are

often confused and misplaced in both The Age of Innocence and WashingtonSquare: parents are not

the only ones who try to protect the safety of manners. Also connected to both upbringing and

14 Henry James, Washington Square, 157-8.15 Henry James, Washington Square, 173.


10/16

parenting is an intriguingly intricate, yet poorly defined and hardly ever exercised rite of passage

that haunts all members of the societies described by James and Wharton. It is haunting in The Age

of Innocence because the tribe applies the same code to everyone equally and the line of adulthood

could divide those who can enforce manners from those who cannot. The only sure boundary

between childhood and maturity seems to be marked in both novels by marriage. Individual rite of

passage is haunting in The Age of Innocence because of its ineffectiveness: it is achieved only

through the social inhibitions by a sense of resignation for some of the characters (e.g. Newland)

and by ignorant or content belonging to the social order for others (e.g. May). In Washington

Square, Catherine seems to achieve maturity to no effect. She is finally willing to leave her father

a natural necessary act of a maturing child but her suitor who is the only one able to encourage her

to take the last step, is not there for her any longer. The rite of passage, so difficult for Catherine to

achieve, becomes a step into loneliness and in the eyes of her father, who represents the standards of

her social stratum; she has no other means of achieving maturity. In the natural order of things, it

should be two mature individuals who enter the marriage, not two children gaining their maturity by

marrying, however both novels seem to represent the latter case.

The ineffective rite of passage is closely tied together with the confusion in parenting:

basically anyone can be bringing up anyone in the years before marriage, and much parenting is

still involved in marriage, both between the spouses and between the married couple and their social

circle. In Washington Square, an intricate cobweb of parenting relations connects Dr. Sloper, Mrs.

Penniman, Mr. Townsend and Catherine.

You have taken up young Townsend; that's your own affair. I have nothing

to do with your sentiments, your fancies, your affections, your delusions;

but what I request of you is that you will keep these things to yourself. I

have explained my views to Catherine; she understands them perfectly, and

anything that she does further in the way of encouraging Mr. Townsend's

attentions will be in deliberate opposition to my wishes.

It seems to me that you talk like a great autocrat.

I talk like my daughter's father.

Not like your sister's brother! cried Lavinia. My dear Lavinia, said

the Doctor, I sometimes wonder whether I am your brother....16

16 Henry James, Washington Square, 163.


11/16

Dr. Sloper naturally watches over his daughter but he also needs to keep an eye on his widow sister

and her peculiar ways; Mrs. Penniman feels an excited (God)mother-like relationship to both

Catherine and Townsend, trying to advise both; Townsend is quite instructive in his relationship to

Catherine. All these relationships, however parent-like they may be, are not connected with

preserving the social code as much as with the individual whishes of the characters. This is where

Washington Square differs significantly from The Age of Innocence, probably because it is set in a

lower social circle than the New York innocently aged aristocracy, and because James was rather

exploiting the Hawthornian father-daughter relationship together with the economic influence on

private life than a wider system of inhibitions. Robert Emmet Long explains that rather than

analyzing a social stratum and its manners, James turned to the convention of the melo-dramatic

fairy-tale (the Cruel Father, Motherless Daughter, Handsome Lover, and Fairy Godmother), and

then presented ironic reversals to the stock responses of its archetypes.17

The Age of Innocence, on the other hand, provides us with numerous instances of social

parenting purely connected with the protection of manners. In this society where no one and

everyone is adult, it is considered very wise to want to be advised in manners. Countess Olenska

turns into such an adult child when she [speaks] of her need of guidance: I want to do what you

all do--I want to feel cared for and safe.18 The arch parents of Whartons characters are the van

der Luydens and all the other characters, except for Countess Olenska, make effort to live up to

their standards and support each other in pursuing this end. This is quite different in Washington

Square where all Catherine, Townsend and Mrs. Penniman along with Mrs. Almond and others try

to somehow reconcile themselves with the arch-parenting of Dr.Sloper they seek his opinion on

their relationships and manners only in order to try and bring about a change of his mind. In both

cases, it is quite difficult to escape the influence of the standard-keepers. It is perhaps as difficult to

restore oneself to the New York standards as it is to leave them. We can see that like many parents,

the members of the New York cream fear that someone could leave the family, as it were. In both

17 Robert Emmet Long, James's Washington Square: The Hawthorne Relation.18 Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence. (London: Penguine Books, 1996), 72.


12/16

novels, deviation from standards within the social paradigm is wrong, but deviating beyond the

paradigm, e.g. by travel, is worse: it is vulgar:

Original! We're all as like each other as those dolls cut out of the same

folded paper. We're like patterns stenciled on a wall. Can't you and I strike

out for ourselves, May?He had stopped and faced her in the excitement of their discussion, and

her eyes rested on him with a bright unclouded admiration.

Mercy--shall we elope? she laughed.

If you would--

You DO love me, Newland! I'm so happy.

But then--why not be happier?

We can't behave like people in novels, though, can we?

Why not--why not--why not?

She looked a little bored by his insistence. She knew very well that they

couldn't, but it was troublesome to have to produce a reason. I'm not clever

enough to argue with you. But that kind of thing is rather--vulgar, isn't it?she suggested, relieved to have hit on a word that would assuredly

extinguish the whole subject.

Are you so much afraid, then, of being vulgar?

She was evidently staggered by this. Of course I should hate itso

would you, she rejoined a trifle irritably.19 [Italics added.]

The conventionality of these inhibitions is quite evident: it is crystal clear thatthingsareacertain

way, being forced to say why is, however, not appropriate as it unsettles the inhibition easily

because the reason is always rather attributive than substantial. The authority of conventions is

more or less evenly distributed among the characters so that it is not individual exemplary

characters but the conventions themselves what the behavior of characters is measured against.

These are the conditions in which the creation of a product of the social system 20 is

achieved in Washington Square and The Age of Innocence. As I have already hinted at some points earlier, all of the complaint-formulation, upbringing and

parenting takes place in the public because nothing is really secret in the New York society. Manners for James and Wharton functioned as doors. They were the

architecture of human behavior, through which ones inner feelings and longings might be concealed, or revealed. Similarly, they signaled where one could and could not

go.21 What is important to add in our case is that while there are still doors in both novels, certain

matters seem to be of such public interest that they are quietly passed to everyone. In The AgeofInnocence, the

central character of Newland notices a general request to be spared whatever was unpleasant in [New Yorks] history [and that it] was perhaps this attitude of mind which

19 Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence. (London: Penguine Books, 1996), 81-82.

20 Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence. (London: Penguine Books, 1996), 40.21

Sarrah Luria, The Architecture of Manners: Henry James, Edith Wharton, and the Mount, American Quarterly, Vol.

49, No. 2 (Jun., 1997), pp. 298-327, The Johns Hopkins University Press at Jstor, 04/12/2009 06:40.


13/16

kept the New York air so pure.22 Describing a little lower social circle, James does not stress such need to avoid

the unpleasant; this request is not even discussed as it represent a much more unconscious code in

Washington Square which is rather bourgeois in comparison to the rather aristocratic code that rules

in The Age of Innocence. For instance, Catherine does not talk to her father about her feelings for

Mr. Townsend too willingly not because the subsequent conflict is considered unpleasant and

disturbing but because sheconsiders it unpleasant and disturbing for herself; that is because the

conversation is neither led nor reported publicly.

By this fact alone and by the other hitherto examples, it is already quite well demonstrated

that there is again much more publicity involved in The Age of Innocence than in Washington

Square as there is a much wider set of characters involved. Publicity in Washington Square is

limited by the fact that no public ceremonial takes place throughout the novels plot and most of the

novel happens in the drawing room and library of Dr. Slopers house. There is, however, much

made public in Dr.Slopers consultations of Catherines situation. Catherines happiness is being

arranged so that it is acceptable and, like in The Age of Innocence, her affairs are discussed within the tribe, or Dr. Slopers

family.

Social inhibitions seem to descend on the characters ofThe Age of Innocence from the compulsory publicity to whose import they both contribute and subject

themselves.

A stormy discussion as to whether the wedding presents should be shown

had darkened the last hours before the wedding; and it seemed

inconceivable to Archer that grown-up people should work themselves into

a state of agitation over such trifles, and that the matter should have been

decided (in the negative) by Mrs. Wellands saying, with indignant tears: Ishould as soon turn the reporters loose in my house. Yet there was a time

when Archer had had definite and rather aggressive opinions on all such

problems, and when everything concerning the manners and customs of his little tribe had seemed to him fraught

with world-wide significance.

And all the while, I suppose, he thought, real people were living

somewhere, and real things happening to them...23[Italics added.]

It is, however, also a self-centered sense of importance that makes the characters establish and

maintain their high social code. This is also why I have been using the noun import to best

22Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence. (London: Penguine Books, 1996), 94.

23Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence. (London: Penguine Books, 1996), 182.


14/16

describe the force of inhibitions: the characters import their sense of significance into their social

code and then inhibit themselves with it. They do so either mutually by means of dialogues and

publicity or individually by means of their own feelings of importance and belonging to a social

stratum. Public disturbance and exclusion poses the sole thread that causes Newland to abandon his

intention to leave May for Countess Olenska, and that causes the tribe not to accuse them from

being lovers but to quietly separate them.

Social inhibitions in Washington Square seem to really work on a much smaller scale. Parenting and childlikeness are prominent between the

two main characters and the public circle is very confound. It is especially the role of the father, as both the highest authority and closest person to the protagonist, that

brings about a sense of guilt making the protagonist rather not choose her beloved decisively while he might still be willing to marry her than lose her father. Most of the

other socially inhibiting factors to influence the life of the protagonist are gender-related and economical because innocence is in Dr. Slopers terms related solely to his

opinions on favorable marital arrangements. At this moment, the role of the suitor, Mr. Townsend, is crucial as he seems to support Dr. Slopers economical views by not

wanting (Catherine) to lose her inheritance. Catherine is hereby recognized as commodity and her social inhibitions are purely gendero-economical, or just economical. The

rest of her inhibitions are constituted by her fathers influence alone by means of a guilty conscience.

The more widely applicable social inhibitions in The Age of Innocence are as forceful as to

lead Newlands steps from his true love to what is socially more acceptable. They are as limiting as

to prevent May from accusing her husband form unfaithfulness and as coordinating as to bring

about a quietly orchestrated separation of the supposed lovers. It is hardly possible to believe that

there is a psychologically justifiable way of denying what Freud calls the pleasure principle this

way without obtaining some kind of retribution. One of the explanations at hand may be the

soothing awareness of belonging to a higher social stratum or to a social circle in general, which can

be observed in the lesser characters ofThe Age of Innocence, like Mr. Jackson and others. The content vanity and the safety in a

paradigm of manners regulating relationships and communication can contribute to the satisfaction from sublimating ones loses to higher principles with which Sarah Luria

chooses to explain the characters behavior.

It is a story of human sacrifice, of renouncing ones innermost desires (for example, love, revenge, illicit passion) for a

potentially higher plane of life. The layers which manners add onto life, separating people from one another and from their desires

and providing a screen for possible deception, become the very source of narrative. It is precisely this tension between ones inner desires and

ones outward actions that Wharton and James find lacking in Gilded Age America .24

24Sarrah Luria, The Architecture of Manners: Henry James, Edith Wharton, and the Mount.


15/16

Even in Washington Square, Catherines living in a chaste and charitable way in her

spinsterhood before and after her fathers death would be considered honorable by her

contemporaries and an honorable way of leading ones life is basically what matters for any

member of a society. This is how far my argument of social inhibition and guilt goes. Considering

that neither of the protagonists of the novels chooses to live with their beloved ones after years

when their position allows them to do so finally, we can only add to Lurias opinion on the matter

that even this sacrifice for a potentially higher plane of life can only mean that the invalidation of

their hitherto life is avoided by the protagonists choice to abandon their loved ones again later in

life. Newland would have to consider his life with May empty which he cannot possibly do in view

of his love for their children, and Catherine would have to both break her fathers wish and confirm

that her worth is in her inheritance confirm that she is a mere commodity. Therefore, the

characters are finally free to choose only the same as they did the first time both from personal

and social reasons.


16/16

Bibliography:

Primary:

Wharton, Edith. The Age of Innocence. London: Penguine Books, 1996.

James, Henry. Washington Square; (in Short Novels of Henry James). New York: Dodd, Mead &Company, 1961.

Secondary:

Bell, Millicent. Edith Wharton and Henry James: The Literary Relation. PMLA, Vol. 74, No. 5

(Dec., 1959), pp. 619-637. Modern Language Association at Jstor. 04/12/2009 06:25

.

Luria, Sarrah. The Architecture of Manners: Henry James, Edith Wharton, and the Mount.American Quarterly, Vol. 49, No. 2 (Jun., 1997), pp. 298-327. The Johns Hopkins University Press

at Jstor. 04/12/2009 06:40 .

Goodman, Susan. Edith Wharton's Mothers and Daughters. Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature,

Vol. 9, No. 1, Women Writing Autobiography (Spring, 1990), pp. 127-131. University of Tulsa at

Jstor. 04/12/2009 06:26 < http://www.jstor.org/stable/464184 >.

Falk, Robert P. Henry James and the Age of Innocence.Nineteenth-Century Fiction, Vol. 7, No.

3 (Dec., 1952), pp. 171-188. University of California Press at Jstor. 04/12/2009 06:25

.

Long, Robert Emmet. James's Washington Square: The Hawthorne Relation. The New England

Quarterly, Vol. 46, No. 4 (Dec., 1973), pp. 573-590. The New England Quarterly, Inc. at Jstor.

04/12/2009 06:40 .

Fracasso, Evelyne E. The Transparent Eyes of May Welland in Wharton's "The Age of

Innocence".Modern Language Studies, Vol. 21, No. 4 (Autumn, 1991), pp. 43-48. Modern

Language Studies at Jstor. 04/12/2009 06:23 .

Documents

Wharton v. James's female characters