I’m reading Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence right now and loving it. I’ve seen the Scorsese movie and enjoyed it, but the book is even more delightful – playful, satirical and romantic all in one – even if Newland is a big sap.
What’s so great about it is the prose. For example, this quotation…man, this quotation:
“Don’t be afraid of me: you needn’t squeeze yourself back into your corner like that. A stolen kiss isn’t what I want. Look: I’m not even trying to touch the sleeve of your jacket. Don’t suppose that I don’t understand your reasons for not wanting to let this feeling between us dwindle into an ordinary hole-and-corner love-affair. I couldn’t have spoken like this yesterday, because when we’ve been apart, and I’m looking forward to seeing you,every thought is burnt up in a great flame. But then you come; and you’re so much more than I remembered, and what I want of you is so much more than an hour or two every now and then, with wastes of thirsty waiting between, that I can sit perfectly still beside you, like this, with that other vision in my mind, just quietly trusting to it to come true.”
Sigh.
Catherine Queen 
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