“Selden paused in surprise. In the afternoon rush of the Grand Central Station his eyes had been refreshed by the sight of Miss Lily Bart.”
If a lot of literature in the early 1800s, especially Jane Austen, is concerned with people finding themselves in the right kind of marriage, by the end, with Thomas Hardy, Henry James, and Edith Wharton leading the way, it’s about seeing what happens when you end up in the wrong kind of marriage.
Here we have Lily Bart, a woman of 30, who in the words of some of her detractors is trying to live a life with the benefits of marriage, without actually being married. I am not sure that’s an entirely fair way to look at her, but she does have some freedom, though not as much as she could. She has a flirtatious friendship with Selden, a recurring figure in her life with some strong amounts of “will they?” about them. But she also runs in other, darker circles, including card-playing ones. Eventually, she plays herself deep into debt and another friend bails her out, and this debt hangs heavily on her. It’s also very much in question about whether or not this is an actual friend (he’s not). This debt also limits what she feels she’s able to offer in a marriage if she were to get married. Well, the book circulates on whether or not she wants to get married, and will she be able to make a free choice in the matter, or whether she will have to compromise something about her life in order to set herself up.