The return of the beautiful Countess Olenska into the conventional society of New York sends reverberations throughout the upper reaches of society. Newland Archer, an eligible young man of the establishment is about to announce his engagement to May Welland, a pretty ingenue, when May's cousin, Countess Olenska, is introduced into their circle. “Wharton is not generally viewed as one of literature’s great optimists, and yet, by the last chapter of The Age of Innocence, people are a little less hypocritical, a little more willing to see and accept the world. ... A larger life and more tolerant views: that’s the greatest promise the novel holds out to us, and it’s as necessary now as it was when Edith Wharton put it into words.”
—Elif Batuman, author of The Idiot, from the foreword

“Will writers ever recover that peculiar blend of security and alertness which characterizes Mrs. Wharton and her tradition?”
—E. M. Forster