Because I roamed the grounds for hours by myself last time, I decided to take the guided tour on Monday. I arrived around 11:00, and first roamed again, then had lunch at the terrace cafe, which has a spectacular view of the grounds. Incidentally, I met a retired couple from Decatur, Georgia who were very sweet. When I heard the wife saying "y'all" so many times, I felt at home.
After lunch, I met the group outside the house to await the tour. The Georgian couple started talking to me and asking me questions about Edith Wharton, which I answered as thoroughly as possible. In a gesture that was both flattering and embarrassing, a woman tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I was giving the tour. I reassured her I was only a visitor, but I must confess I was rather proud to be mistaken for the tour guide!
The tour was an excellent introduction for anyone not familiar with Edith Wharton's life or works. I was surprised when she asked the group if they had ever read her works, and only half of them had. The rest of them had only read one or two of her books. And then there's me, the nerd. When the docent asked me how many I read, I just said, "A lot." I'd have to sit down and count how many books by and about Wharton I've read over the years. That is thanks in part to interest, but also to my thesis director: whenever I asked her a question, she replied simply, "You need to read more," and she would print me a list of books from the Thomas Cooper catalog that was several pages long. As a result, I've read most secondary sources on Wharton that were published before 2010, and I've read a good bit of Wharton's writing. Her work has always been important to me, both professionally and personally, so coming to her house both times was a thrill.
One of the first details of the house that Ann, the docent, addressed was the symmetry. If you look at the front, you can see how the windows all align, but there are some shutters that are closed:
Ann pointed out that the closed "windows" were not windows at all, but Wharton designed them to look that way to maintain symmetry. Also, in the center windows on the second and third floors, the windows are open. When you are standing outside the house and look directly into the windows, it looks as though you are looking through the house. However, Wharton was pulling a little architectural trick; what she did was put large mirrors directly across from the windows to reflect the woods. As a result, the house looks much bigger than it really is. Pretty clever, eh?
Much of the house is designed this way. The entire structure of the house is symmetrical. Doors facing each other at the end of the halls, the numbers of windows, the design of entrances into rooms - everything is made to look ordered and even. Ann pointed out that in the design of the house you can see Wharton's struggle with the rigidity of her class: she rebels against it in keeping the house rather modest architecturally (no chandeliers, no gaudy designs or wallpaper, etc.), but she also conforms by keeping her house in such a rigid, structured design.
Take, for instance, the inside of the first floor.
As you can see, the entry way is very plain but elegant - much like everything with Wharton. The mirrored doors in the bottom picture lead to a servants' area, which is closed to the public. Essentially, guests would enter the first floor and wait for the butler to see if "Mrs. Wharton" was accepting company; if she wasn't, you had to leave.
Teddy Wharton's rooms are interesting as well, and they reveal his personality. Teddy and Edith had a bad marriage, but it was mostly because they were completely ill-suited. Teddy was carefree, part of the leisure class, and had no taste for anything intellectual, especially literature. Edith had a history of depression and anxiety, and she had been incredibly precocious and intellectual her whole life; in her autobiography A Backward Glance, which is a must-read, she says that as a little girl, her favorite activity was to go "make up," which meant she would hold a book from her father's library in her hands and walk around while she "made up" the words in the book aloud. She had wanted to be a writer ever since she understood what writing was, but her family never took her seriously, nor did they encourage her. She had two older brothers whom her mother favored over Edith, and Edith never had any kind of formal education, which makes her literary achievements, to me, that much more incredible.
She married Teddy when she was 24, which in those days was considered spinster age. They were engaged very briefly - engaged in January, married in April. I think her mother pushed the quick engagement so that Edith would not be considered an "old maid" when she did wed Teddy. Not surprisingly, as those who have read The Age of Innocence know, Newland Archer's rushed engagement has terrible consequences; I'm certain Edith used her own experience to color Newland's choices.
She and Teddy were married for twenty years and divorced by 1913. What happened was Teddy began to show signs of mental illness while they lived at The Mount (from about 1902 - 1914), and historians believe he had bi-polar disorder, which at the time had neither treatment nor even a name. Teddy grew more and more ill, and he began to have wild states of mania. His adultery was rampant, too, and he took Edith's money: $50,000, which today would be the equivalent of about $1.1 million. He was named the trustee to Edith's inheritance, and he used this $50,000 to build his mistress a swanky Parisian penthouse. Needless to say, when he confessed to Edith, it was the final straw, and she filed for divorce.
It is important to remember a few key things with this marriage. One, Edith's inheritance was not nearly as massive as many people of her class. Her oldest brother, Frederic, received the bulk of the family fortune, and her younger brother, Henry, got a smaller portion. The remainder of the money was divided into thirds. This means Edith inherited one-third of the remaining scraps of the inheritance. As a result, Edith made most of her money herself through her books. She wrote over 40 books in 40 years, and was most successful. In fact, she built The Mount with her money made from the success of The House of Mirth. Considering Edith also designed it and paid for it herself, The Mount was really and truly Edith's house. The fact that she sold it when she got divorced is quite tragic, really.
Another important thing to remember is divorce 100 years ago was a colossal scandal. People who got divorced were seen as outcasts, as trashy people who had failed at life. When Edith got divorced, she moved to France and stayed there for the rest of her life. She was also shut out of some social circles for being a divorcee`, which she explored so movingly in The Age of Innocence.
At The Mount are two nice displays about Teddy: one in his bedroom, one in his den.
The second floor is very open and bright without being ostentatious.
Teddy's den, which you see below, was an open, airy room with some secret doors.
One of the jokes was that Teddy's door to the library was a secret because he probably never opened it!
The rest of the house is like this, as I wrote last time. The grounds are magnificent, and there are some interesting animals there. Take, for instance, this garden snake I found:
When I got home that day, I found a tick on my ankle! I got the critter off of me and gave him a "burial at sea" (i.e., flushed him down the toilet). I must say, ticks were not something I associated with The Mount!
The house looks bigger than it really is. Look at these views! Bear in mind, Edith also designed the gardens.
One thing I found very touching, as a dog lover, was Edith's doggie cemetery. I noticed most of her dogs died in January, which was Edith's birth month (January 24). My sweet Jasmine died only a week before my 22nd birthday, so I completely know how she must have felt.
The cemetery is at the top of this random hill. It was scenic and somber. I took pictures of each doggie's tombstone.
There are also several paths to take to venture out into nature. On my first visit, I went through all of them, but yesterday I kept it simple and only walked down two or three.
The gift shop at The Mount has some really neat stuff. Evidently, there is a man who hand-makes jewelry designed to look like first editions of all of Edith's books. You can buy a charm, a charm and necklace, or a pair of earrings. I couldn't help myself; I bought Age of Innocence and Summer earrings, and I will wear them with pride!
I bought a friend of mine a gift, but in case he's reading this, it will remain a secret.
Lastly, before calling my taxi and returning to my hotel, I was very thirsty and decided to buy a drink at the terrace cafe. One of the drinks they had was an orange soda, and I bought it. And I drank it. This may not sound like a big deal to some reading this blog, but the truth is I have not been able to drink orange soda since I was 19 years old and a girl poured a massive 32 ounce cup of orange soda on my face while I was having a seizure. That entire incident was jam packed with horrible stupidity - a man took his belt off his pants and "offered" to put it in my mouth, people were running and screaming, a woman jumped on top of me while I was convulsing and shouted for someone to get her a wooden spoon - but the orange soda was the icing on the cake. It is a story I enjoy telling because it is almost too outrageous to be believed, but it was very, very true. And in a way, orange soda has kind of served as a symbol of how I have felt about having seizures. I have not been able even to look at it since then, let alone drink it. When I drank that soda, I felt as though I had closed a door on a very sad and stressful part of my life.
As I drank this, I thought about the impact Edith Wharton's works have had on my life and how much reading her work has helped me understand and articulate many complicated emotions I have felt. As silly as it may sound, I said a quiet prayer of thanks for her work and for the wonderful opportunity to see her home that inspired so much of her great fiction. Merci, Madame Wharton.
Well, tomorrow marks the end of my trip! I will be returning to Columbia, South Carolina, and from then on it's back to work! This trip has been incredibly rewarding; I have learned so much about travel and about myself on this journey. I feel confident about traveling alone, and I feel I exorcised some darker emotions while here - emotions that I hope to replace with some happiness in the days to come.
That's all, folks!
Laura
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