The House of Mirth
Eventually, Lily Bart receives a ten-thousand-dollar inheritance from her Aunt Peniston, which she arranges to use to repay Gus Trenor. Distraught by her misfortunes, Lily has by this time begun regularly using a sleeping draught of chloral hydrate to escape the pain of poverty and social ostracism. Once she has repaid all her debts, Lily takes an overdose of the sleeping draught and dies; perhaps it is suicide, perhaps an accident. That very morning, Lawrence Selden arrives to her quarters, to finally propose marriage, but finds Lily Bart dead. Among her belongings are receipts for her payments toward the debt she owed to Gus Trenor, proving that her financial dealings with Trenor were honorable and not evidence of an improper relationship. His realization allows him to feel sympathy and closeness for her, and he is clearly distraught by her death.
The House of Mirth
Because of the novel's commercial success, some critics classified it as a genre novel. However, Wharton's pastor, then rector of Trinity Church in Manhattan, wrote to tell her that her novel was "a terrible but just arraignment of the social misconduct which begins in folly and ends in moral and spiritual death."(310) This moral purpose was not lost on the literary reviewers and critics of the time who tended to categorize it as both social satire and a novel of manners. Carol Singley in her Introduction to "Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth: A Case Book" states, "["The House of Mirth"] is a unique blend of romance, realism, and naturalism,[and thus] transcends the narrow classification of a novel of manners." (3)
"The House of Mirth" was Wharton's second published novel and was preceded by two novellas, "The Touchstone" (1900), "Sanctuary" (1903), and one full-length novel, "The Valley of Decision" (1902). Her subsequent important novels are "Ethan Frome" (1911), "The Custom of the Country" (1913), and "The Age of Innocence" (1920) for which she won the Pulitzer Prize in 1921. These works influenced a host of American authors for two generations. They include F. Scott Fitzgerald ("The Great Gatsby)", Sinclair Lewis ("Main Street"), John O'Hara ("Appointment in Samarra"), and Louis Auchincloss ("The House of Five Talents").