The House of Mirth: Book 1 V-VI

This next section of Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth has Lily rethinking her possible marriage to Percy Gryce.  Seldon has Lily thinking about a good life without extreme amounts of money and that true happiness is personal freedom from everything.  Wharton uses imagery throughout these sections to convey the emotions of the characters.  Seldon and Lily go on a walk together and Wharton uses the imagery to describe the intensity of the feelings the two are having for each other.  Specifically Wharton does this at the beginning of section six, when describing the Sunday afternoon between Lily and Seldon.  Wharton describes the afternoon and then paints the picture of it here, 

"The afternoon was perfect.  A deeper stillness possessed the air, and theglitter of the American autumn was tempered by a haze which diffused the brightness without dulling it," (Wharton, 50).

Wharton continues the use of imagery here,

"She had risen, and he stood facing her with his eyes on hers.  The soft isolation of the falling day enveloped them: they seemed lifted into a finer air.  All the exquisite influences of the hour trembled in their veins, and drew them to each other as the loosened leaves were drawn to the earth," (Wharton, 58).

Carefully crafting her writing, Wharton uses imagery also to express Lily's desires and what she believes she has to do to have a happy or a good life.  Lily believes that to be happy she needs large amounts of money and a very wealthy husband, which she sees in Percy Gryce.  But, what Lily really wants is to have be entertained and be free to do whatever she wants.  I believe that through the rest of the novel we will see this constant inner conflict in Lily.