Social Hierarchy In Edith Wharton's House Of Mirth

Mental Illness affects an immense amount of individuals no matter their race, culture or age. It is everywhere we go, yet still an issue some choose to ignore; whether it is the person facing the illness or those around them. People handle their sickness in a variety of ways. Some by using violence as their only answer, others run away from their issue and majority choose to accept and make the best of it. After reading the novel The Secret Life of Bees, it would be easy to think that the main theme is discrimination or family, but in reality it is actually focused on the toll that mental illness takes on a family. The protagonist of this novel, Lily Owens, has always had a troublesome life. Both her parents, Terrence Owens, also known as T. Ray, and Deborah Fontanel are ridden with illness, sadly caused from each other. Lily also meets a new family in this novel after running away from her cruel father who abuses her. This family is also dealing with mental illness. August Boatwright is a member of this family and has been surrounded by this sickness for more than half of her life. Two of her sisters have this problem and it has genuinely affected August for better or worse.

The impact of socioeconomic status can be examined through a myriad of lenses. F. Scott Fitzgerald aims to show the relationship between socioeconomic status and power. Throughout The Great Gatsby, Tom’s character shows that socioeconomic status is equivalent to power within the novel.

Permanence, perseverance and persistence in spite of all obstacles, discouragements, and impossibilities: It is this, that in all things distinguishes the strong soul from the weak.”-Thomas Carlyle. In the novel Secret Life of Bees, Lily is a harmless, kind hearted girl who has experienced much in the short life she has lived. The last time Lily has felt kindness, gentleness, and love was when her mother was alive. “People who think dying is the worst thing don’t know a thing about life (2).” Lily is lost in her head, she doesn't know how to stick up for herself. She takes in all the abuse, both mentally and physically from T.Ray and she blames everything on herself. Throughout the novel Lily gains her confidence, bravery and strength by standing up to the challenges she faces throughout experiencing new cultures and way of knowledge.

Rosaleen was an very strong role model in Lily’s life. The author Sue Monk Kidd portrays it in the novel in many ways. Lily’s mother passed away and left when Lilly was just a little girl sitting at only 4 years old. Since that day Rosaleen decided too stepped in and showed her all the steps in life, even if she was there housekeeper but they still created such a strong bond. Rosaleen was a African American so lily did experience the racial hatred Rosaleen received but Lily did not care what color she was all she cared was what the person she was in the inside. The author portrays their relationship as a family. Kidd showed how Lily and Rosaleen cared and loved each other more like a family would than a friend would since all they had were each other cause T-ray, ( Lily’s fathers ) who wasn’t all that such a father figure in her life. She showed them sticking through everything not giving up on each other. When Rosaleen got into the conflict with the white men lily was the one who helps her out of the hospital where the arresting officers had beaten her up.

I thought this was an interesting read because it gave insight to what it might have been like in the twentieth century. The House of Mirth was written by Edith Wharton, who was very big into naturalism. The story revolves around the female lead character, Lily Bart, and her struggle to find what she deems as happiness. Through Lily’s story we see what it was like to be a woman and the importance of marriage and social status in the time period.

Eudora Welty’s short story, Lily Daw and The Three Ladies is about a mentally retarded young girl who has decided to make a big life decision. This causes conflict with the three ladies that have helped taken care of her since her mother died, because they too have made a decision for Lily without her knowledge. The main focus of the story is love in relation to society. Welty uses lily and the three ladies to argue the strict societal values that the ladies follow and how lily is a free spirit.

The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd, is an interesting story that connects human lives to bees. The story takes place in 1964 during the Civil Rights Movement and fourteen year-old Lily Owens leaves her abusive father and her home in Sylvan, South Carolina to go to Tiburon with hopes to find information on her mother. Throughout the story, Lily struggles with many internal conflicts and also meets several mother figures along the way. In the story, Kidd’s use of characterization successfully reveals the theme that people's lives are more complex than they appear. Kidd demonstrates this theme using the characterization of Lily, T. Ray, May, and Deborah.

In the story “Lily Daw and the Three Ladies”, we are introduced to our three ladies who are: Mrs. Carson, Mrs. Watts and Aimee. These three ladies speak about a young girl who seems to have some sort of disability or as mentioned in the story was “feebleminded”, this young girl goes by name of Lily Daw. I assume that Lily has a disability not only because the three ladies are trying to send her to this mental institute for the “feebleminded” but because the author portrays Lily’s character with a very special tone of voice and her character is also not able to make-out correct full sentences like the rest of the characters in the story. The author Eudora Welty introduces this story as, “a half-witted girl in the grip of social forces represented by a group of earnest ladies bent on doing the best thing for her, no matter what the consequences”

Edith Wharton's Age of Innocence offers a distinctive close examination of the Gilded Age's New York high society where critics have the opportunity to study and analyze several aspects of this exclusive American milieu, and as a result, the novel offers a glimpse of this society's social institutions of the time. In Age of Innocence, the elite of New York reside solely in their own sphere; they all live very close to one another, save for the van der Luydens, in a predetermined area, effectively shutting themselves from those outside their social circles. This isolation is shown with the uproar Ellen Olenska caused when she chose to place her home among artisans instead of other well-respected families, and it is further emphasized during

Forgiveness is defined as the intentional and voluntary process by which a victim undergoes a change in feelings and attitude regarding an offense. Additionally, the victims release themselves from any negative emotion such as vengefulness, with an increased ability to wish the offender away. Lily, the protagonist, in The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd, undergoes a change from feeling angry about the circumstances surrounding her mother’s death, to feeling forgiveness for all the hurt along way. In this bildungsroman, Lily narrates herself as a courageous and intelligent girl with many insecurities as well as prejudices. Furthermore, Lily has much animosity towards herself. She states, “She was all I wanted. And I took her away” (Kidd 8). Additionally, “The day she died was December 3, 1954” (Kidd 5). As a child Lily involuntarily discharged a gun, causing the death of her mother (Deborah Fontanel). This event would thusly cause the theme of forgiveness to recur multiple times throughout the

The character of Lily Owens evolves and changes as any young woman would throughout the course of her life. Lily begins the book as an insecure, detached, and unaware teenage girl. We see how Lily changed into a wise young woman as she solves the mystery of her mother’s life. Towards the end of the book Lily transforms into a young woman who is much more confident, happier, and vicarious. Lily has learned about love and biases. She learns that people are not always perfect and that love can be shaped by bonds rather than blood. Lily is more self-sufficient as the book progresses. Since Lily has accepted the truth, she has matured and become content with herself and her life.

The author of the Secret Life of Bees chose to use Lily, the young white female protagonist on the precipice of adulthood, in order to better tell this story. Lily serves the role as narrator, and we see the story through her eyes – providing a unique insight that no other character in the story would give, being an outsider in Tiburon, as well as her journey of self-discovery that is at the core of this book.

Lily’s insecurity is displayed through her actions in school when encountering the more popular girls, “I started picking scabs off my body and, when I didn’t have any, gnawing the flesh around my fingernails until I as a bleeding wreck” (Kidd 9). For instance, Lily’s act of shying away from others and picking at her scabs helped to emphasize her discomfort when people she considered her betters, in style at least, surrounding Lily and reminding her about her own less than satisfactory personal looks. Furthermore, her self-consciousness, along with her inborn daringness led her to run away from home, and take Rosaleen with her. In brief, the lack of parental guidance for Lily led her to be slightly unstable, and embarrassed about herself in general led her to run away from home, and the instability caused her to start stealing and lying.

finds herself struggling against a man versus society conflict, as she confronts the rich first class

As American business man, Richard M. Devos, once said, “Money cannot buy peace of mind. It cannot heal ruptured relationships, or build meaning into a life that has none.” In the novel, The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott, Fitzgerald, Daisy, an elite socialite, is blinded by dollar signs and makes multiple decisions based on class, ultimately leading to the destruction of those who she claims to love, and without a doubt love and idolize her. Jay Gatsby has been in love with Daisy for five years, and supposedly she is with him, but she’s too impatient to wait for Gatsby while he is at war and decides to marry an arrogant, racist, and rude former college football star, Tom Buchanan, for money. Daisy is a self-absorbed, vacuous socialite whose decisions lead to the destruction of Gatsby.