Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-10-30
MRS. EDITH WHARTON
SURPRISES HERSELF
Her Latest Commentary on
Life Reaches a High
artistic Level

After Edith Wharton is dead--may
that unhappy day be long postponed
some pupil Of Freud win doubtless apply
to her literary output the principles Of
psyche analysis, in an effort to explain
how and why she has done what she
has. 1t would be ungracious to do 1t
while she is still alive.
In her new novel, "The Age of In
nocence," Mrs. Wharton handles in a
new, form the motive which has inspired
most OF what she has written. In doing
1t she has produced work of surprising
art. Those who read merely for the
story will find It absorbing. but the
more discriminating will be delighted by
the skill with which the characters are
drawn, the mastery with which the
crises are approached and developed and
the poetic and touching manner of its
end.
1t is tale of New York in the
seventies Of the last century. Its heroine
is the Countess Olenska, q member of a
New York family, who married Polish
count, lived with him q few years and
then fed from his brutalities and in
fidelities to take refuge with her own
people In her native city. The hero Is
Newland Archer, a man who had played
with her In her childhood and who,
when the story opens, is engaged to
marry a beautiful girl, q cousin Of the
countess, who is merely young woman
| Of the conventional type, with no in
sight into life and no intellectual in
| terests. There would have been no
| story II the countess had remained in
Europe. But Archer, who Is a student
! Of art and literature, has travelled and
has interests outside of the routine life
Of a narrow and exclusive social set !.
| finds that he and the countess meet on
common intellectual grounds. When
society" plans to turn a cold shoulder
| on her because she has left her husband.
he goes to her rescue with his social
influence and when he finds himself fall =
ing in love with her he hastens his mar"
riage. Then follows the struggle Of the
man to make his wife happy while his
heart Is not in her keeping. lie meets
the countess occasionally and the story
of those meetings is told with knowl-
edge of the human heart as it beats in
the breast OF honorable men ana women
which is possessed only by few novelists.
This love affair is a moving tragedy Of
the emotions. The countess, when she
discovers that it Is imprudent to remain
in New York so long as Archer finds
1t impossible to refrain from seeing her,
goes to Paris. The book ends thirty
Years later, with Archer in the street
outside Of her apartment unable to bring
himself to 60 up to see her. As her
blinds are drawn in the growing dust he
goes away cherishing his romance as q
precious thing. p.
As the story progresses Mrs. Wharton
deals with the New York society of the
time in a most penetrating manner. She
describes the he -gossips. the unfaithful
husbands who profess indignation at the
conduct of the countess in leaving her
own husband, the concentration Of in
terest in family and the pride of the
families in their conservatism. There
is a delightful touch when Mrs. Archer
is made to say Of her husband that he
has no difficulty in disposing Of his time
for when he has nothing else to do he
reads book" .r.'
Mrs. Wharton has never written a
more artistic or more satisfying novel.
THE AGE OF INNOCENCE. BY Edith
Wharton. New York: d. Appleton Co.