CLASSIC: "Summer" by Edith Wharton

 STORYTELLING: 5/5 

WRITING STYLE: 5/5

THEMES/MESSAGE: 3/5

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT: 4/5

IMPACT/ENGAGEMENT: 4/5

Total Grade: B (84%)

“She had always kept to herself, contemptuously aloof from village lovemaking, without exactly knowing whether her fierce pride was due to the sense of her tainted origin, or whether she was reserving herself for a more brilliant fate,” (31). 

This was a splendid read, though the ending left me with many mixed feelings. But for my first Wharton read, I couldn’t be more pleased. Let’s get into it!

Summer by Edith Wharton follows the life of Charity Royall, a sheltered yet feisty protagonist, who becomes smitten with a handsome and worldly architect, Lucius Harney, who is in town for the summer. Charity was adopted by local attorney (and chronic drunkard), Mr. Royall, who saved her from the impoverished mountain community that looms just above the town in which the story’s set, and the two maintain an odd relationship; Mr. Royall attempts to persuade her into marriage several times, and she resists and ridicules him at every attempt. We follow her romantic indulgences, her harsh and sudden downfall, and the consolation of the two which left me with the strangest feeling; I was caught somewhere relief, heartache, and dissatisfaction. 

While it took me quite a while to finish this book (it’s more of a novella than a novel), I was fully engaged every time I picked it up, and I attribute that to the beautiful language and the pace. Wharton’s writing style glorifies the beauty in nature, human connection, and the sensations of the human heart. The details and descriptions surrounding Charity’s internality was truly breathtaking–I nearly highlighted this entire book. 

Charity was such a wonderful character, and not easily defined. Passive in some instances, as we see in the ending, but feisty, emotional, rebellious, thoughtful, and steady in a lot of ways, too. She, more than anything, is what made this book feel so modern, and her relationship with Harney and Mr. Royall accentuated this feeling of modernity. She’s not afraid to tell people how she feels. Yes, she has her passive moments but the reader understands why she chooses to be passive in the particular moment, or why she chooses to fly off the handle. The stages of her emotions are always clear but very dream-like. We’re in this summery existence with her, leaning into this very vivid saturation of life and longing and heightened emotions and fears, but it’s enjoyable, every second, because Wharton is a smart and sensitive writer and I love her now. 

“The only reality was the wondrous unfolding of her new self, the reaching out to the light of all her contracted tendrils. She had lived all her life among people whose sensibilities seemed to have withered for lack of use; and more wonderful, at first, than Harney’s endearments were the words that were a part of them. She had always thought of love as something confused and furtive, and he made it as bright and open as the summer air,” (98). 

Harney and Charity…where to start with those two? I feel betrayed, in many ways, despite my new love for Ms. Wharton because she let me fall in love with Harney (spoiler ahead), only so he could get her knocked up and get engaged to someone else. (There’s a moment, too, where Charity compares herself to this other woman and boy oh boy…I swear those thoughts have at some point in time existed inside the head of every single woman at some point or another). But I will say one thing–it’s realistic, brutally realistic, and I’ll always appreciate that. Not to be a Debbie-downer, but I’m fine with a disappointing story because life’s a little disappointing at times. Still, it’s lovely to see the two of them interact and fall in love. It definitely felt like a Marianne Dashwood/John Willoughby sort of situation. She sets him free, brings him to life, acts as a distraction from his “real life” and stifling responsibilities WHEN IN ACTUALITY, she is probably the realist thing he’s experienced to date. It’s a hard life being a manic pixie dream girl but here we are. And we’re almost as blindsided as she is but also not–we saw him talking to Annabel Balch at the big town shindig! I rest my case…

“All these memories, and a thousand others, hummed through her brain till his nearness grew so vivid that she felt his fingers in her hair, and his warm breath on her cheek as he bent her head back like a flower. These things were hers; they had passed into her blood, and become a part of her, they were building the child in her womb; it was impossible to tear asunder strands of life so interwoven,” (127).  

So, yes, Charity ends up pregnant with Harney’s child. She never tells him this. She then runs up to the mountain because she feels she needs to figure out who her mother is and perhaps derive from her some comfort or reassurance about her current situation. Oh but wait–she arrives just as her mother is dying and doesn’t get a chance to speak with her. And actually buries her immediately after she gets there. There’s A LOT to unpack there. A death occurs at the moment new life is being contemplated, Charity’s isolation in this world is doubled, and the only security, true, substantial security she receives is from Mr. Royall and his final offer (stern suggestion, rather) of marriage, which she submits to for a number of reasons, and I’m not mad at her in the slightest. I think she chose the best option for herself really, and it makes me wonder how this book was received in the time of its publication (1917). Wharton is very clear about the fact that Charity feels no shame or guilt about the decisions she makes and the routes she takes–she always has a clear and thoughtful motive to her big decisions, and she doesn’t dwell in regret in the way one might expect of a single mother around the time of the first World War. And in many ways, I think it’s just as brave to choose and commit to a life she knows is necessary for her and her child’s future security and safety, while it isn’t what her heart desires, as it would be for her to set off on her own, settle in the mountain, impoverished and hardened by her circumstances. 

The book is very clear in that there will always be a tension between what we want and what is right. Paradise has a place in our hearts and lives and demands to be cherished, but reality is always on the outskirts waiting for our return. There will always be circumstances that ask more of us than we feel we’re willing or able to give, and the decisions we make in those moments reveal what we’re made of. 

Is it a little creepy that she married her adopted (adoptive?) father? Yes, but, as strange as it sounds, I don’t think he proposed for unloving or creepy reasons. You just need to read it. 

Swoon-worthy and real, I’m so happy it exists and that I was able to read it. Ahhh, courage, dear heart.