Lily Bart Downfall

In the late nineteenth century, women’s focus was solely on the social aspect of life. Women were brought up in a time where their lives revolved around finding a rich husband, getting in with the right social circles, and maintaining the beautiful physique that was society’s norm and expectations. In the novel The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton, Lily Bart fights internal battles to try make her dreams come true. Lily is ultimately her own downfall; being overly concerned with her social status and what society expects from a woman in this time period, and while battling her heart to decide her fate, she ends up destroying her dreams instead of fulfilling them. Lily Bart’s mother set an idea in Lily’s head from a young age; the idea that she only had to be beautiful to succeed in life. Growing up, her mother taught her that her

Women were not supposed to work, they were to find a husband, have children and take care of the household. The task of working fell to the men. The upper class was highly esteemed in the culture and Lily’s goal was to become a well respected socialite. She spent her money on upper class niceties, such as dresses, shoes and jewels, trying to fit in. She lost a lot of money in the game of bridge, a common game for the upper class women to play, mainly because they could afford it. But Lily, in fact, could not. She went into debt trying to fit in, and had to rely on other people to pull her out of it. She paid off her gambling debts herself, but needed Mrs. Peniston to pay off her clothing debts. Lily did not take her debts lightly. She knew they were serious and she did not want to be know for being it debt. “That walk she did not mean to miss; one glance at the bills on her writing-table was enough to recall its necessity. (Wharton 5)” Lily tried to become someone she was not and suffered the consequences of her