The Touchstone

By Edith Wharton

Glennard had never thought himself a hero; but he had been certain that he was incapable of baseness.

The story of a young man who scorns the love of a tortured novelist, only to have her words come back to haunt him from the dead, The Touchstone shows off the skills Wharton became famous for in novels such as Ethan Frome and House of Mirth, particularly her piercing and delicious talent for satiric observation. But despite its masterly control, this startlingly modern tale is also a simmering, rebel cri de coeur unleashed by a writer who was herself unappreciated in her own time. The combination of these attributes make this edgy novella a moving and suspenseful homage to the power of literature itself.

The Art of The Novella Series

Too short to be a novel, too long to be a short story, the novella is generally unrecognized by academics and publishers. Nonetheless, it is a form beloved and practiced by literature's greatest writers. In the Art Of The Novella series, Melville House celebrates this renegade art form and its practitioners with titles that are, in many instances, presented in book form for the first time.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Nov 6, 2012
• ISBN: 9781612192413

Edith Wharton

Edith Wharton (1862–1937) was the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Having grown up in an upper-class, tightly controlled society known as “Old New York” at a time when women were discouraged from achieving anything beyond a proper marriage, Wharton broke through these strictures to become one of that society’s fiercest critics as well as one of America’s greatest writers. The author of more than 40 books in 40 years, Wharton’s oeuvre includes classic works of American literature such as The House of Mirth, The Custom of the Country, The Age of Innocence, and Ethan Frome, as well as authoritative works on architecture, gardens, interior design, and travel.

Reviews for The Touchstone

[cbjames_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Touchstone by Edith Wharton is not something I would have ever read had it not been for the Novella Challenge. The Novella Challenge is my favorite one so far because it has brought so many wonderful books to my attention. I never would have given novellas a second thought otherwise and would have missed out on all the terrific books I read for the challenge: Faulkner's "Old Man", Thomas Wolfe's "The Lost Boy," Marquez's "No One Writes to the Colonel". Edith Wharton's "The Touchstone" can hold it's own among these and probably any other novella one can find."The Touchstone" is about Stepehn Glennard, a man of marrying age who has been seeing a young woman whom he loves for two years. Unfortunately, Glennard does not have the money or the position to marry. The time is the second half of the 19th century, and Glennard is the sort of man who has to loiter around his club waiting for someone to invite him to dinner because he does not have the money to do the inviting himself. What he does have is a collection of letters from the famous Mrs. Aubyn, the greatest novelist of her generation. She was once in love with Glennard and wrote to him faithfully during their time together and after he broke off the relationship. Mrs. Aubyn did not have many close friends and never told anyone that Glennard was the love of her life, that he broke her heart or that she poured her heart out to him in a series of letters over a period of several years.Now, after Mrs. Aubyn's death, her reputation has grown and the stack of letters is worth quite a bit. Should Glennard publish them he could make well over 10,000 dollars, enough to invest, to gain a position and to marry the woman he loves. But to publish the letters is a base act, a betrayal that would label Glennard as a scoundrel should anyone find out. Publishing the letters would make it possible for him to marry but it would also make him unworthy of the woman he loves.This situation certainly caught my interest. I won't divulge any more of the story because I want to encourage readers to give "The Touchstone" a try. This is the only work of Ms. Wharton's that I've read, but I intend to rectify that situation shortly. The story is quite simple, but the novella is still a page turner. Events soon get out of Glennard's control which only makes the reader want to know what happens next with even greater urgency. Ms. Wharton can certainly tell a story. The issues may seem a bit foreign to 21st century readers--can anyone imagine somebody hesitating before publishing private letters worth a fortune after Linda Tripp's betrayal of Monica Lewinsky's trust? Well, maybe one can actually. I found that this archaic element only added to my interest in the story. "The Touchstone" offers an entertaining tale and the satisfaction of learning what life was like in it's time period, the same satisfaction many readers get from historical fiction.Possible Spoiler Alert: I have to say that I was disappointed a little with the ending. I won't give it away except to say that I felt it relied too heavily on the myth of the good woman. Glennard's wife is so morally upright that she is able to make him a better man through her example. I suspect this was just what Ms. Wharton's contemporary readership wanted in an ending, but it was a little hard for me to swallow. Other than that, I highly recommend "The Touchstone" by Edith Wharton. I'm giving it five out of five stars

[luli81_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Upsetting reading about feeling guilty and bearing the cross on your shoulders and final atonement.

[ricefun · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

In my quest to immerse myself in Wharton in 2013, I was lucky to choose to read her earliest novel first in my marathon of Wharton works. I can see some of the literary stretching and testing that later turns into to Wharton's brilliantly full-bodied characters and stories. I was surprised to learn in the Epilogue of the copy I own that the story became shockingly autobiographical, because Wharton's only lover saved and sold for petty profit the letters she wrote to him. A sorry character, he did give contemporary readers the gift of having the opportunity to peer into Wharton's private thoughts.

[kplatypus_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

One of Edith Wharton's shorter, earlier, and happier books, The Touchstone looks at the ways in which the choices we make can come back to haunt us. Glennard, the main character, must weigh his desires and logic against what he feels to be right and then live with the consequences of his actions. It is also about the relationship between a husband and wife and how it evolves throughout a marriage. There are some amazing lines that demonstrate what a depth of insight Wharton really had into our relations with each other, such as: "We live in our own souls as in an unmapped region, a few acres of which we have cleared for our habitation; while of the nature of those nearest to us we know but the boundaries that march with ours." I love Edith Wharton.

[anesamiller · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This was the 2nd book by Wharton (a novella) that I read after THE AGE OF INNOCENCE. As compared to that wonderful book, this one is set in a slightly less aristocratic world, although the sensibility remains snobbish and self-absorbed. The language is intellectual, complex and elegant. Emphasis falls on subtle shades of emotion and morality.

“How could he continue to play his part, with this poison of indifference stealing through his veins? …What he wanted now was not immunity but castigation: his wife’s indignation might still reconcile him to himself. Her scorn was the moral antiseptic that he needed.”

The book’s protagonist is debating whether or not to sell a collection of personal letters he received over a period of years from a woman (now deceased) who later became a renowned novelist. Formerly Miss Aubyn’s friend and confidant, the hero let his correspondence with her die out after realizing he would never love her as a woman. He acknowledged that she was his moral and mental superior but not a potential life partner.

When the story begins, the hero is married and has a young child. He is keen to maintain them in the style to which they are accustomed, and he stands to obtain a considerable sum from the sale of the letters. The resulting moral struggle makes a far more engrossing tale than this attempt at retelling conveys. I recommend it to all Wharton fans and readers of historic American fiction.