mrs. manson mingott

The Age of Innocence- Edith Wharton

Mrs. Manson Mingott. At once a curiosity in upper class New York society as well as the very definition of it. She is seen as the most powerful of the Mingott Clan, the one that everyone must please and the one that gives the final say on any significant decisions in the family. It is because of her and her fondness for Ellen that the family begrudgingly takes on the responsibility of bringing Ellen into upper class New York society even though everyone else is convinced that Ellen does not belong. It is through her influence that Newland archer is able to convince his future mother-in-law to hold his wedding with May earlier despite her earlier adamancy that the proper preparation could not be completed without more time. When she holds so much power within her own family and is also well-known in society in general, she is surely force to be reckoned with, as well as someone to be looked at closely.

Despite her influence in the upper class New York society that is so particular about rules and conformity, Mrs. Manson Mingott’s ways are a far cry from conformity. She herself was not originally a member of the upper class, having married into it from a poor family with no powerful title. From there, she continued to walk the fine line between accepted and eccentric. She sent married her daughters to foreigners. She built a house in the “middle of nowhere” as everyone in the upper class society saw it. She backed Ellen Olenska when everyone else had given up on her. Strangest of all was the fact that her actions were accepted, even “admired” by Newland, even though she was a woman, a fact that seems completely contrary to everything that upper class New York society believed in. In this society, where women’s eyes were “bandaged” from when they were little and these women were given in this ignorant state to a husband almost as property with no real power speak of, Mrs. Manson Mingott had risen in power to head a family of considerable prestige. Her husband had died when she was fairly young yet she managed to hold together the family and build it up, and she was not considered audacious for invading what one would think to be the world of men at the time. Instead Newland describes her as admirable. Such a character seems to have to place in the conservative upper class society of New York.

Yet at the same time, she seems to represent everything about that society, even in her physical appearance. She’s described as having become so obese that she had turned “vast and august as a natural phenomenon.” She isn’t even able to move up and down stairs, restricted to one floor and only a few rooms. Her figure has become large to the point that she can no longer move freely, cemented into one position in the same way that the society she lives in is set in their ways and is almost fearful of change as is seen in Mrs. Archer’s “annual pronouncement” of all the changes that had occurred in society and her conviction that it was “changing or the worse.” Her life of opulence also perfectly reflects the upper class New York society. When everything is judged by how things look and whether or not your wealth has been adequately displayed, as seen in the continuous efforts of the Beauforts to broadcast their wealth, Mrs. Manson Mingott fits right in with her house modeled after aristocratic hotels and filled with only the finest of furniture.

But with one side that is so revolutionary and daring, going up against every expectation that society has of her, and another side that adheres to conformity and what is acceptable to those around her, Mrs. Manson Mingott is woman of what seems to be irreconcilable opposites. But at the same time, that seems to be exactly Newland’s position as well. Split between the newness and eccentricity of Ellen Olenska and the comfort and familiarity of May Welland, Newland may admire the dichotomy he sees in Mrs. Manson Mingott because he too is searching for that perfect balance.