The House of Mirth

Edith Wharton’s novel of Lily Bart, a beautiful, well-born but penniless young woman in New York society at the turn of the century, who must marry money to keep her place in it.

Start reading29 chapters, about 131,000 words

Famous quotes

• She was so evidently the victim of the civilization which had produced her, that the links of her bracelet seemed like manacles chaining her to her fate.

  Book One, Chapter 1In context

  • Freedom

• To keep a kind of republic of the spirit⁠—that’s what I call success.

  Book One, Chapter 6In context

  • Freedom
  • Success

• The only way not to think about money is to have a great deal of it.

  bk.1, ch. 6In context

  • Money

• No insect hangs its nest on threads as frail as those which will sustain the weight of human vanity.

  ch. X, pg. 69In context

  • Pride

• I have tried hard⁠—but life is difficult, and I am a very useless person. I can hardly be said to have an independent existence. I was just a screw or a cog in the great machine I called life, and when I dropped out of it I found I was of no use anywhere else.

  Book Two, Chapter 12In context

  • Failure
  • Life & Death

• He knelt by the bed and bent over her, draining their last moment to its lees; and in the silence there passed between them the word which made all clear.

  Book Two, Chapter 14In context

  • Life & Death
  • Love

Contents

Book One

1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10
11. Chapter 11
12. Chapter 12
13. Chapter 13
14. Chapter 14
15. Chapter 15

Book Two

1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10
11. Chapter 11
12. Chapter 12
13. Chapter 13
14. Chapter 14