Anti Vacation

As the second book of The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton opens, Lily cruises across the Mediterranean with the Dorsets. Lily figures that this vacation is just what she needs to escape from her seemingly collapsing life. The Dorsets were willing to allow Lily to accompany them. However, I think that the feuding between Lily and Bertha is only just starting to fulminate. The wanted break from her stressful life was starting to slip from her fingertips. I think that Bertha is starting to get upset with Lily's ability to stay at the top of the social ladder even after her continual tribulations. "A chill of fear passed over Miss Bart: a sense of remembered treachery that was like the gleam of a knife in the dusk. But the compassion, in a moment, got the better of her instinctive recoil" (Wharton, 168). This quote shows that the confrontation with Bertha is only allowing her to remember how she felt prior to the trip. I think that Lily will only be able to put her life back together by accepting everything that has been going wrong in her life. I believe that by starting with acceptance, she will be able to rebuild herself.