Author Archive | Kelsey

“Just a matter of words:” Reading Addie Bundren

After the chaotic fording scene, and bookended by both of the novel’s religious characters, is Addie Bundren’s singular monologue. The Bundren matriarch has been silent up until her death, so prior to this chapter her character is solely comprised of impressions related by her children, husband, and neighbors. Addie’s monologue divulges her rather sadistic attitude […]

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Consumerist Culture and the Commodification of Beauty

The early chapters of Edith Wharton’s House of Mirth follow socialite Lily Bart’s exploits among the economic and social elite in New York during the turn of the twentieth century. The novel provides as its setting the critical moment when consumerism in America was rapidly expanding and the pursuit of material goods was less concerned […]

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