Beauty In Vanity, Love In Mirage

Edith Wharton was one of the most prominent American female writers at the turn of twentieth century. She was adept at describing the life of the upper class in "Old New York". Especially, she was skilled in disclosing the moral crisis of the upper class produced by the impact of commodity economy, and the heavy price they paid for their conservatism and hypocrisy. This thesis tries, with the theory of Aristotelian tragedy, to describe Wharton's main work The Age of Innocence, aiming to explore and prove that vanity is definitely, the artificial beauty; mirage can absolutely, produce a tragic love. Only when people stride over the fence of vanity, can they get hold of happiness.