I hate unhappy endings. So, yes this novel was a huge disappointment to me.
As much as I was not expecting the ending, I am not very surprised, either. I just hate when a book ends, leaving everyone to make their own assumptions about what happened next, but here we are with a hundred unanswered questions. However, the ending does comply with our ongoing theme of materialism. Plainly, simply: money, wealth, power, reputation, and those materialistic things do not assure happiness in life. And for some people that's okay. For Mr. Rosedale, Bertha Dorset, Percy Gryce, Mr. and Mrs. Bry, and many other characters, that is okay for them. But for Lily Bart, Seldon, and Gerty Farish, it's not. It may have taken Lily an entire novel and a random run-in with Nettie Struther-practically a stranger- for her to finally come to terms with this fact of life. "But it had taken two to build the nest; the man's faith as well as the woman's courage" (Wharton 260). Giving up love for money may work for some people, but Lily has a big heart, and Seldon was right all along- that kind of a life would never satisfy her. And realizing this, makes me all the more upset with the way things ended. I truly believe after all those times I was disappointed thinking she would change and didn't, I believe now that she really was going to change this time and become the person that I wanted to see the entire novel. The one who chooses love. But it was a tragedy, and tragedies don't have happy endings.
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