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Most Edith Wharton scholars have argued The House of Mirth1 (1905) and The Age of Innocence2 (1920) to be naturalist novels interwoven with and based upon socio-economic determinism. Feminist critics, such as Judith Fetterley and Cynthia Griffin Wolff, have depicted Lily Bart in The House of Mirth as a victim of patriarchal society; meanwhile, Marxist critics like Wai-Chee Dimock have been preoccupied with the omnipresent power of the marketplace in the novel. In the case of The Age of Innocence, the criticism has often focused on Wharton's usage of the tribal world of manners as the determining and inescapable force in an individual's life.3 This thesis will engage in reading The House of Mirth and The Age of Innocence as naturalist novels with an emphasis on the notion of human conduct and ethics. |
