The House of Mirth & The Invisible Man
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The American dream is something often presented in fiction as a distortion and an illusion, as something individuals strive for either in the wrong fashion or in a futile attempt to gain something withheld from them. It is seen in both The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton and The Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison as something that only comes to certain classes in society while it is held out as an unattainable ideal to the masses. In the Wharton novel, there are certain clear paths to achieve this dream, at least as far as the heroine is concerned, and marriage is the path she sees as most viable for her. In the Ellison novel, it is a dream that has little meaning to the black population, standing simply as another promise unfulfilled. In the Wharton novel, though, the idea of the American dream is tightly bound with money, and money is a determinant of social class in America much more than is birth. For Lily Bart, the American Dream would be to have both money and position, and if she has to sacrifice the man she really loves to reach this goal, she will. Selden is that man, and the American Dream is a distant and unreal goal for him as well. Lily's dream is actually a form of the American Dream, which is the expression of American optimism that the future can always be better, that success is possible through the application of individual effort and ability, and that one is not bound by birth to a particular social class, economic position, or role in life. Lily is a
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edicated to hunting as a sport that tests them while also putting them more in touch with nature. Both find that the ideal and the reality of the small town are far apart, though, and while for Wade this leads to paranoia, for Nick it becomes a sadness expressed in his fiction.
Indeed, Nick has an advantage because he has an outlet for his feelings, his frustrations, and his fears, while Wade does not. Wade does not even have anyone to talk to about his problems except his brother, and he is too proud to seek out anyone to talk to in this way in any case. Nick may also be alone, but he can reshape his reality into fiction which allows him to communicate with people he does not even know.
Nick lives at a time of war, and in the stories about him there is a contrast between the world of Michigan, the small-town world from which he came, and the world of the war to which he is sent. Wade Whitehorse is waging his own war within the small town where he lives. Part of that war is within himself, and another part comes out in clashes with others. Nick has a more clearly defined enemy than does Wade, whose true enemy is himself. Yet Nick also finds that the idyllic nature of Michigan is not as idyllic as it has seemed, and in "
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1701
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)
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