or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
 
More Buying Choices
12 used & new from £7.21
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
Sanctuary (Pine Street Books)
 
 
Share your own customer images
Search inside this book

Sanctuary (Pine Street Books) (Paperback)

by Edith Wharton (Author) "IT is not often that youth allows itself to feel undividedly happy: the sensation is too much the result of selection and elimination to be..." (more)
3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
Price: £13.00 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
Usually dispatched within 1 to 3 weeks.
Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk. Gift-wrap available.

9 new from £7.21 3 used from £9.99
Other Editions: RRP: Our Price: Other Offers:
Hardcover £13.45 £13.45 13 used & new from £12.13
Paperback £6.99 £6.29 37 used & new from £0.01
Library Binding Order it used
Paperback (Large Print) £9.09 £9.09 12 used & new from £4.22
Unknown Binding Order it used

Frequently Bought Together

Customers buy this book with The Touchstone (Hesperus Classics) by Edith Wharton

Sanctuary (Pine Street Books) + The Touchstone (Hesperus Classics)
Price For Both: £18.24

One of these items ships sooner than the other. Show details

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

The Touchstone (Hesperus Classics)

The Touchstone (Hesperus Classics)

by Edith Wharton
4.0 out of 5 stars (1)  £5.24
I am Mary Dunne

I am Mary Dunne

by Brian Moore
4.0 out of 5 stars (1)  £9.99
The Reader

The Reader

by Bernhard Schlink
3.9 out of 5 stars (103)  £3.93
› Explore similar items

Product details

  • Paperback: 216 pages
  • Publisher: Pine Street Books (20 Sep 2001)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0812217926
  • ISBN-13: 978-0812217926
  • Product Dimensions: 20.7 x 14 x 1.6 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 3,430,077 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    •  Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?

Product Description

Review

"It is good, ethically and artistically, to read and read again a book with such a lift."-New York Times "A striking little book, striking in its simplicity and penetration, its passion and restraint."-Times Literary Supplement


Product Description

Kate Orme is a young woman whose illusions of marital bliss are shattered when she comes face to face with the dark secret harbored by her fiance, the wealthy and deceptively ebullient Denis. Kate decides to go ahead and marry Denis, however, as a selfless gesture to protect any child he may conceive from inheriting their father's moral weakness. The couple does have a child, Dick, and in a marriage with a man that Kate has admittedly ceased to love, she transfers her original affections for Denis to their son.Denis dies suddenly and Kate is left to raise their young son. Knowing that Dick could have inherited the faults of his father, Kate anticipates a time when Dick's morality will be severely tested. That time comes years later when Dick, an eligible bachelor and aspiring professional, is faced with a dilemma that will affect the course of his life. With the precision, beauty, and sharp awareness of the cracks in upper-class New York society that made her one of the great writers of the twentieth century, Edith Wharton offers a subtle critique of the nature versus nurture debate that raged in the early 1900s. "Sanctuary" is a spare and moving investigation of the forces that impel human beings toward sin, self-doubt, and redemption.
See all Product Description
Inside This Book (Learn More)
First Sentence
IT is not often that youth allows itself to feel undividedly happy: the sensation is too much the result of selection and elimination to be within reach of the awakening clutch on life. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
Search inside this book:

Suggested Tags from Similar Products

 (What's this?)
Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
 
edith wharton
sanctuary
women writers
women
wharton and james - northeastern twiligh...
wharton
20th century american fiction
20th centure american literature

Your tags: Add your first tag
 
See most popular tags

What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

Sanctuary (Pine Street Books)
45% buy the item featured on this page:
Sanctuary (Pine Street Books) 3.0 out of 5 stars (2)
£13.00
The Music Room
31% buy
The Music Room 4.2 out of 5 stars (36)
£9.01
The Snow Geese
24% buy
The Snow Geese 4.4 out of 5 stars (9)
£4.99
Explore similar items
 

Customer Reviews

2 Reviews
5 star:    (0)
4 star:    (0)
3 star:
 (2)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.0 out of 5 stars (2 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars Secrets and lies, 12 Jun 2007
By E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" (MD USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Sanctuary (Hesperus Classics) (Paperback)
Edith Wharton's writing wallows in moral struggles and societal pressures, usually about adultery and social-climbing. But she tries a different approach for the novella "Sanctuary," a story that is thought-provoking and well-written, but feels more like the outline to a full-length novel than a story in its own right.

Kate Orme is wrapped up in her idyllic engagement to Denis, when a woman claiming to be his dissolute brother's wife kills herself and her child. To Kate's shock, Denis confesses that the woman was, but to avoid having a low-class person in the family, he suppressed evidence and lied. Even worse, he feels no guilt because he considers it worth the sacrifice.

Kate breaks off the engagement, but to protect any child of Denis' from his hypocrisies, she marries him. Many years later, Denis is dead, and their young son Dick is a blossoming architect about to enter a prestigious contest. But then a friend of his dies tragically, and leaves Dick his brilliant architectural plans... to enter in the contest as his own. Now Kate must see if her careful upbringing will make Dick do the right thing, or if he will follow in his father's footsteps.

Most of Wharton's books are wrapped up in ethical dilemmas or one kind or another, but "Sanctuary" tackles a very different kind of problem. And Wharton does a good job spinning out a sense of suspense, all about a young man who could tip either way, and inspiring disgust and outrage at Denis' weak, whiny defense of his crimes.

Sadly, the second half reads like Wharton was sketching out an enlarged outline for a novel, but got bored and just published it as-is. Details are sketchy, as is the society that these people live in, and more than two decades are skipped over instantly. Little of the storyline is fleshed out except for Kate's (seemingly endless) angst, which trickles on throughout way too many of the few pages.

Kate herself isn't easy to relate to -- she marries wussy Denis for a kid that might or might not be born, and spends most of the book torturing herself over Dick's future choices. She comes across as naive at best, manic at worst. Dick himself is a far more interesting character, since he exists in the grey area that most human beings inhabit -- he's a partying, slightly slackerish guy, but essentially good at heart.

"Sanctuary" tackles the grey areas and hypocrises of many "upright" people, but the second half drizzles off into a lot of bad angst and extreme reactions. Interesting, but it feels half-written.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
3.0 out of 5 stars An Unusual Story, 26 Jun 2009
This review is from: Sanctuary (Paperback)
"Sanctuary" is a novella by Edith Wharton, published in 1903. From what I have read, the plot did not cause any surprises at the time, but today the story seems rather unusual. It is a story which deals with ethics, morality, and family honor. While there is nothing particularly unusual in that, some of the choices made by the main character, Kate, seem rather drastic today, and one has a difficult time imagining that any woman today would make similar choices. The story is divided into two parts.

In the first part, we get to know Kate Orme, a woman who is engaged to Denis Payton. She is a woman who has been sheltered from the realities of the world, and comes to learn of an unpleasant situation involving Arthur, Denis' half-brother after he has passed on. Through learning about the situation and how Arthur's family handles it, Kate is upset with Denis and pushes him to do the moral thing. Arthur mother comes to talk with her, and Kate learns that it isn't just Denis who is willing to protect the family name regardless of the act. Lastly, she learns from her own father that scandal's have been covered up in her own family. After a bit of soul-searching, Kate comes to the conclusion that the most moral thing for her to do is to marry Denis so that she can try to remove the character taint which his yet to be conceived son have. This decision appears to be very unusual and it is doubtful that anyone today would reason in such a way. Kate also seems to ignore that she herself must be tainted since her own father and family also has displayed moral weakness.

Part two picks up several years later. We learn that Denis passed on when their son, Dick was young, and that he squandered most of their money. We also learn that Kate has put her own interests aside to get Dick the best education she can. Dick is starting his career and an ethical dilemma arises which has Kate worried. She is suspicious of the motives of those around Dick, and becomes worried that he is making the wrong choice. Everything seems to be pushing him towards the wrong path, and the similarities between his reaction and that of his father Denis when he was trying to hide the truth from her are readily apparent.

It will likely be difficult for many modern-day readers to understand the motivation of Kate in this story, but that is due to changes in our society, and not a flaw in the book itself. Nevertheless, I don't think this book is quite as good as Edith Wharton's previously published works and so I round this one down to three stars. It is still worth reading, especially for those who enjoy her other works, but it isn't quite as accessible.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)


Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Only search this product's reviews


Customer Discussions

This product's forum
Discussion Replies Latest Post
No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 


Active discussions in related forums
   
Related forums

Listmania!

Create a Listmania! list

Look for similar items by category

Look for similar items by subject















i.e., each product must be in subject 1 AND subject 2 AND ...

Feedback

Ad

Your Recent History

 (What's this?)

After viewing product detail pages or search results, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in.