The Age of Innocence
Newland Archer is a young Manhattan lawyer from the right family, engaged to the lovely, conventional May Welland, and entirely comfortable with the closed social rituals of 1870s New York high society until May's cousin, the Countess Ellen Olenska, returns to the city. Ellen has left a brutal Polish count and is considering a scandalous divorce, and the family assigns Newland to guide her safely through New York's rules. Over the following years, between operas, country house visits, and the careful public choreography of his marriage, Newland and Ellen conduct the unresolved affair that will define both of their adult lives without ever quite taking place. Edith Wharton's 1920 novel, which made her the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, is the classic American novel of renunciation, social tribe, and the price of keeping appearances.
Themes & atmosphere
What you might want to know about The Age of Innocence
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
In 1870s New York, lawyer Newland Archer is comfortably engaged to the lovely, conventional May Welland when her cousin Countess Ellen Olenska comes back from Europe, fleeing her marriage and asking for a divorce.
Yes. The Age of Innocence won the 1921 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Edith Wharton was the first woman to win the Pulitzer for Fiction.
Yes. The Age of Innocence was published in 1920 and is in the public domain. Free editions are available legally through Project Gutenberg.
The Age of Innocence was written by Edith Wharton, published in 2001 by CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform.
The Age of Innocence is 112 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, The Age of Innocence takes most readers about 2 hours to finish.
The Age of Innocence is a standalone novel by Edith Wharton, not part of a series.
The Age of Innocence is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.