The Age of Innocence is a novel by Edith Wharton published in 1920. In the high society of 1870s New York, the lawyer Newland Archer is engaged to the conventional May Welland, but falls in love with her cousin, the unconventional Countess Ellen Olenska. In 1921 it made Wharton the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
The story
Ellen Olenska returns to New York after leaving her husband, a Polish count. Her freedom shocks the old families, and Newland is asked to persuade her not to divorce.
Torn between duty and passion, Newland marries May. The rest of the novel follows his quiet struggle against the rules of his world.
Old New York
Wharton describes with irony the rituals of the New York elite of her childhood: the opera, the balls, the visits, and the unspoken rules.
Behind the polished manners, the society protects itself with silent and powerful pressure.
A look back
Written after the First World War, the novel looks back on a vanished world with both criticism and nostalgia.
Its final chapter, set some thirty years later, is one of the most admired endings in American fiction.
Anecdotes
The first woman
When the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction was awarded to The Age of Innocence in 1921, Edith Wharton became the first woman to receive it.
Written in France
Wharton wrote the novel in France, where she had settled before the war and where she had done relief work for refugees.
Frequently asked questions
Who is Newland Archer?
A young New York lawyer torn between two women.
Who is Ellen Olenska?
May's cousin, a countess who has left her husband.
Which prize did the novel win?
The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, in 1921.