Riassunto
Riassunto di La pietra di paragone
A chi è rivolto
For readers who love precise novels about conscience, marriage and money, and anyone curious about Wharton before her later fame.
Che cos’è questo libro
The Touchstone is a short novel by Edith Wharton, published in 1900. It is set in New York among people who care about money, manners and reputation. Wharton wrote it early in her career, before the long novels that made her name, and it already shows her gift for watching how a small private act can shape a whole life.
The story centers on Stephen Glennard, a lawyer who is short of money and in love with a woman he cannot yet afford to marry. He also holds a bundle of letters from a dead woman, a famous writer who once loved him more than he loved her. What he does with those letters starts the trouble. In this summary you will meet the three people at the heart of the book, follow the choices that bind them, and see how Wharton turns a quiet drawing room drama into a study of conscience. Let us begin with the man who has too little money and too much to lose.
In questo riassunto
- 1A poor man with a rich secretFree
- 2The letters left behind
- 3A choice made for love and money
- 4Marriage with a ghost in the house
- 5What guilt does to a man and a marriage
- 6How Wharton tells it
Punto chiave 1 di 6
A poor man with a rich secret
Stephen Glennard is a New York lawyer of modest means. He is educated and well liked, but his income is thin, and in the world he moves in, thin means limited. He loves Alexa Trent, a young woman of good character, and he wants to marry her. Money is the wall between them.
Wharton sets up this pressure with care. Glennard is not shown as a villain or a schemer at the start. He is an ordinary man with ordinary wishes who feels that life has put a price on happiness he cannot pay. The reader is meant to understand him before judging him.
Behind him stands another figure who is no longer alive. Margaret Aubyn was a novelist of real standing, admired by many readers who knew her only through her books. Glennard knew her as a person. She was older than the young woman he now loves, and she had given him something he never fully returned.
So the book opens with a double situation. A living love lies ahead of Glennard and a dead one lies behind him. Wharton lets us feel that the second may not stay buried, and that the first may be built on shaky ground.
That’s 1 of 6 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Who’s who
- Stephen Glennard
- Stephen Glennard is a New York lawyer of modest means who loves Alexa Trent and keeps Margaret Aubyn’s letters.
- Alexa Trent
- Alexa Trent is the sincere, sympathetic young woman Glennard hopes to marry, whose writings by Margaret Aubyn move her.
- Margaret Aubyn
- Margaret Aubyn is a deceased, gifted writer who loved Glennard more deeply than he loved her.
- Mrs. Armiger
- Mrs. Armiger belongs to Glennard’s social circle and admires Margaret Aubyn, keeping her memory present in conversation.
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 28,000 words
- Reading timeAbout 1 h 50 min
- FormatseBook, large-print eBook, audiobook, 15-minute summary
- LanguagesEnglish and 11 other languages
Questions about La pietra di paragone
What is The Touchstone by Edith Wharton about?
It is about a New York lawyer, Stephen Glennard, who uses the letters of a dead woman novelist who loved him to solve his money problems. The book follows the effect of that choice on his conscience and his marriage.
When was The Touchstone written?
Edith Wharton published The Touchstone in 1900. It is an early work of hers, written before her best-known novels, and it is a short novel rather than a long one, set in her own New York world.
What does the title The Touchstone mean?
A touchstone is a hard stone used to test the purity of gold by the mark it leaves. In the book the letters and the guilt they bring test the character of the people involved.
Is The Touchstone hard to read?
No. It is a short novel with one clear story: a lawyer, a bundle of letters, and the choice he makes. It keeps to a small group of people, and each decision leads straight to the next, so it is easy to follow from the first page.
Is The Touchstone worth reading if I like Edith Wharton?
Yes. It shows her early interest in conscience, money and reputation, themes she develops later. It is a compact way to see her method before the longer, better-known novels.