Summer | Criticism

  • Degradation and Forbidden Love in Edith Wharton's Summer

    In the following essay, Grafton analyzes the relationship between Charity and Harney, particularly Harney’s need “for a certain degradation of Charity,” by referencing an essay by Sigmund Freud.

  • Charity Royall in Summer

    Bily is an instructor at Adrian College in Adrian, Michigan. In this essay, Bily examines how Charity Royall receives and rejects clothing and other objects of adornment from men in Summer.

  • Settings and Landscape

    Covintree is a graduate student and expository writing instructor in the Writing, Literature, and Publishing department at Emerson College. In this essay, Covintree explores how settings and landscape mirror the emotional/moral life of the novel’s main character, Charity Royall.

  • The Role of Nature and Culture in Summer

    Dupler is a writer, teacher, and independent scholar. In the following essay, Dupler discusses the role of nature and culture in Summer, with particular attention to the part played by shame in the society of the novel.

  • The Divided Conflict of Edith Wharton’s Summer

    In the following essay, Wershoven argues that Summer is “both Charity and Lawyer Royall’s story, a dual conflict and . . . a dual growth. . . .”