#may newland

[jomiddlemarch]

Each time you happen to me all over again

“It’s a lot of fuss over nothing, a lot of silly nonsense and fretting, and I can hardly countenance that you’ve let them all convince you, Dr. Foster,” Mrs. Manson Mingott said, as if she hadn’t been saying something similar since he’d arrived. He could tell, if none of her servants and family could not, that despite her attempt at asperity she was fearful, a state she was unaccustomed to, and that allowed him to take a breath and modulate his tone, instead of responding with a completely exasperated exclamation.

“You. Had. A. Stroke,” he said, pausing between each word in some vain hope that she might accept his diagnosis. She was possibly his most difficult patient and it was not unusual for him to look back on his time in Alexandria with a fond nostalgia after a house-call paid to her at her vast brick mansion overlooking the park. “Call it an apoplexy if you wish, it’s all the same and the consequences are unchanged. You must begin to take my advice or the next time your family send for me, there will be nothing I can do.”

“How brusque you are!” she replied. “To speak to me so—”

“You retain me as your personal physician for just that reason, madam,” he said. “You know I have too much respect for you to prevaricate.” Rude was what Mary would have called him, had she heard the exchange, frank and ill-advised and would have reminded him of the woman’s frailty. But she would have smiled as she said it and reminded him he’d survived four years with Miss Hastings, he might do well to curb his tongue with Mrs. Manson Mingott as he’d managed with the former paragon of the Crimea.

“You’re no sycophant, I’ll give you that,” the older woman said, pursing her lips and shrugging her shoulders. “Though a little of the famed Southern charm wouldn’t go amiss.”

“I’m afraid that is reserved for ballrooms and barbecues, not your sickbed. Will you take the tonic I leave for you and follow my instructions regarding your diet?” he said.

“I cannot survive on consommé and that foul sassafras concoction,” she said.

“You cannot survive without them,” he replied. “Another four-course dinner with petit fours and canards a la Rouennaise will finish you off. And you cannot think to restore yourself with a good burgundy.”

“You speak like an epicure,” she said, with more reflection than accusation in her tone. “I should not have thought the table of a Bostonian matron would groan so.”

“Mrs. Foster would only take offense at your assuming her to be a Bostonian, when she is in fact from the relative wilds of New Hampshire,” Jed said. “We do eat more simply than the Beauforts and van der Luydens. It’s not a household overflowing with Allemande sauce.”

“What a droll image,” Mrs. Manson Mingott said, her smile lopsided but genuine.

“You must rest now, I think, Mrs. Mingott, and I’ll be back to look in on you tomorrow,” he said, noting the fatigue in her small, dark eyes, the effort it was taking her to keep from collapsing back on the myriad pillows surrounding her. If he hurried, he would find Mary in the sitting room with Susannah on her lap and the boys sprawled on the rug before the fire, Daniel reading aloud while Timothy and John sorted out whatever small treasures they’d accumulated, pebbles and twigs and the odd jay’s feather, as they listened to their brother and their mother’s occasional and gentle corrections of a mispronounced word. He felt a sudden pity for the old ill woman before him, swathed in Belgian lace and frills. Her family would come to see her, but the comfortable and amiable warmth of his own home was something she’d never have, for all her wealth and power.

“Have your butler send for young Mrs. Archer,” he added. May was Mrs. Mingott’s favorite granddaughter, the least likely to unsettle her, conventional, happily or at least respectably married. He’d met her once and she reminded him of Emma Green when she’d first come to Mansion House to work, fresh and dainty as a rosebud and equally certain of herself and her society. Mrs. Mingott was beyond any revelation; it would be a marvel if she ever left the confines of her elegant house. Any further change was beyond her.

[insomnimelodies]

inktober 9 - sun

silly little sundancer design

[pemberlaey]

if anybody cares my essay on may welland / the systemic infantilization of young women in old new york high society was finally published <3

[wulfhalls]

15 pages into the age of innocence like: may welland get behind me!!!!!

[letmereadinpeace4]

I just finished "The Age of Innocence" by Edith Wharton. It belongs to the (large) category of books that have been in my bookshelf for years because I never got around to read them out of some misgiving about their entertainment value. Like many of the books belonging to this category, it turns out it is a masterpiece! I enjoyed it much more that I thought I would.

I really enjoyed the depiction of this period and of the social politics that dominated and ruled the New York of that time. It creates such a brutal, cold and superficial world that everyone both submits to and maintain. However, the highlight for me were the three central characters:

Newland Archer is a character that I didn't like as a person, but that I found utterly fascinating as a character. He sees the failings and the superficially of the world he is part of and wants to rebel, but at the same time he does not have the resolution and strength to actually do any meaningful rebellion. While his love for Ellen was somewhat touching, I am really convinced that he saw her more as an ideal of the romance and escapism he wishes he had than as an actual person. The conclusion of his character was tragic, but perfectly in line with how he has been depicted so far. What really caught my attention however was his arrogance, especially when directed towards people he sees as inferior. From the very first time he is introduced he speaks of "freeing" his future wife, May, from the ideals she has been taught. He never considers whether she might actually been interested in arts or literature, or interests himself in what she actually likes. He just assumes she is a product of the society that raised her and even when she proves she is much more than an innocent ingenue, he never quite makes the effort to see her as a real person.

Ellen Olenska was a brilliant character. Running from an abusive marriage, she hopes to find a stable life in New York society, and slowly realizes the cruelty and rigidity of that world. Her story was tragic, and the way she is completely misunderstood and criticized by society and her own family really shows the cruelty women of that time faced when they tried to rebel against convention. However, what Archer Newland couldn't accomplish (even though he had more ressources than her), she actually accomplishes, and finds some semblance of freedom in Paris. I really hope that once she left New York, she had a great and fulfilling life and (hopefully) some romantic affairs with men (or women) that had more character and resolution than Archer.

And finally, my dearest and my favorite character of the novel, May Welland! I didn't expect to like her character as much as I did. She really shows how women of that time, however conventional or "boring" they might seem, managed to get what they wanted through manipulation and the usage of social politics. May gave one chance to Archer Newland to get what he really wanted, and when he blew it, she was like "Well I gave you one shot and you didn't take it, now you are going to face your responsibilities!". She had such a pragmatic attitude towards her husband and his affair, and I can admire that. I really wish she had the chance to find who she truly was beyond the conventions and values she had been taught, but I am glad that she managed to get some form of happiness or at least contentment in her life.

[mydaylight]

Now that I finally finished Age of Innocence (which I have to admit took me ages after I dropped the book several times) I just want to say that I think it would be very funny if Gladys has a son and names him Russell. I think that would be hilarious actually.

[writinginthesecrettrees]

The movie's trying so hard to make me feel bad for Newland, but I just don't. May gave him a chance to back out of their engagement; he chose to go through with it. And then he goes on to regret it immediately. Chickenshit.

I need to read the book.

[tweedfrog]

I think as a fan of romance and also a real life human sometimes you need to understand that the girl isn't going to go for the better guy she's going to go for the guy she wants and sometimes the guy she wants is her sewer rat of a bf she's been in love with since 14 and you have to figure out a way to live with that

[navree]

i always forget how much i hate the age of innocence until i am reminded that it exists, and then i remember that i do in fact really hate it

[todaysdocument]

Circular Letter from the Woman's Protest Committee on the Statehood Bill

Record Group 46: Records of the U.S. SenateSeries: Petitions and Related Documents That Were Presented, Read, or TabledFile Unit: Petitions and Memorials, Resolutions of State Legislatures, and Related Documents Which Were Tabled

WOMAN'S PROTEST COMMITTEE.

[small horizontal line]

"The Status of Woman Marks the Degree of a Nation's Civilization."

OCTOBER 22nd, 1904.

DEAR MADAM:-A bill is now pending in Congress which so vitally affects the interests of women in the great South-

West that we believe you and your organization would like to protest against the injustice therein threatened our sisters.

The bill proposes to unite Oklahoma and Indian Territories into one State under the name of Oklahoma, and to com-

bine New Mexico and Arizona Territories into a State under the name of Arizona. This measure has passed the Lower House

of Congress, has been read twice in the Senate and is now before the Senate Committee on Territories, of which Senator Al-

bert J Beveridge is Chairman, and the following named Senators are also members: William P. Dillingham, Knute Nelson,

Thomas R. Bard, Henry E. Burnham, John Kean, William B. Bate, Thomas M. Patterson, James P. Clarke and Francis G.

Newlands. Now is the time to amend, while the bill is in Committee.

The portion of the bill threatening injustice to the women in the proposed new States is found in Paragraph 5 of Sec-

tions 3 and 21, which would allow these States, when organized, to disfranchise minors, criminals, lunatics, non-residents,

ignoramuses and [italic] women. This part of the bill reads as follows:

"Fifth-That said State shall never enact any law restricting or abridging the right of suffrage on account

"of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, or on account of any other conditions or qualificartions, save

"and except on account of illiteracy, minority, [italic] sex, conviction of felony, mental condition, or residence; pro-

vided, however, that any such restrictions shall be made uniform and applicable alike to all citizens."

There may be other objections to this part of the bill, that Congress gratuitously interferes to forbid negro disfranchise-

ment, or disfranchisement "for any other conditions or qualifications," which latter will prevent disfranchisement for lack of

United States citizenship, a prohibition never before laid on a State. This wording will be interpreted by some as even pro-

hibiting the future enfranchisement of women in these new States. These paragraphs might well be omitted.

But the injustice to women might be averted if only the word "sex" were stricken from the paragraphs. The pioneer

women of the West, who have labored and suffered by their husbands' sides to advance civilization, ought not to be so unjustly

classed with felons, lunatics and children, while their own husbands, equals in other respects, are enfranchised. The Congress

of the United States ought not to set its seal upon the possibility of the perpetual disfranchisement of these women, an un-

merited disgrace and punishment. It is true that in many States women have been tacitly ranked with these defective delin-

quent and dependent classes, but never before has the insult been so open and flagrant, nor has it been in an Act of Congress.

The representative of the United States Government, the Territorial Governor of Arizona, once before interfered in

Arizona legislation to the defeat of women, by vetoing the woman suffrage bill passed by the Legislature of Arizona.

The women of all our great country should now protest against the women of the Southwest being ranked with the

classed justly disfranchised, any other member of which may be effort, behavior, or lapse of time, achieve enfranchisement.

Will you not ask your organization to write to the two Senators from your own State, to Senator Beveridge, the Chair-

man of the Committee on Territories, and to the rest of the Committee, asking each to work for the omission of the word

"sex" from the two paragraphs quoted above, or for the omission of the entire paragraphs.

There is need of haste in this matter and we urge action by your organization at the earliest possible date.

The sending out of this letter is authorized by the following named women, who, as individuals, urge you to take

speedy action:

Mrs. Ellen M. Henrotin, Honorary President General Federation of Women's Clubs; Miss Susan B. Anthony, Honorary

President National American Woman Suffrage Association; Mrs. Mary Wood Swift, President National Council of Women;

Mrs. Hannah G. Solomon, President National Council Jewish Women; Rev. Anna H. Shaw, President National American

Woman Suffrage Association; Mrs. Mary A. Livermore; Mrs. Fanny Garrison Villard; Miss Laura Clay; Miss Margaret Haley,

President National Teachers' Federation; Mrs. Ella S. Stewart, Franchise Superintendent of National Women's Temperance

Union; Mrs. Emily W. Thorndyke, President National Catholic Woman's League; Mrs. Lida P. Robinson, President Arizona

Woman Suffrage Association; Mrs. Elizabeth M. Gilmer, (Dorothy Dix); Mrs. Mary T. Hagar, President National Ladies of

the Grand Army of the Republic; Mrs. Ellen C. Sargent, Honorary President of California Woman's Suffrage Association; Mres.

Mary S. Sperry, President California Woman Suffrage Association; Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch, Legal Advisor National

American Woman Suffrage Association; Miss Clara Barton; Mrs. May Wright Sewall, Honorary President International Coun-

cil of Women; Mrs. Elmina Springer, of the Woman's Relief Corps and Eastern Star; Mrs. Florence Kelley; Mrs. Emmy C.

Evald, President National Lutheran Woman's League; Mrs. Frederick Schoff, President National Congress of Mothers; Mrs.

Leonora M. Lake; Mrs. Margaret Dye Ellis, Legislative Superintendent of National Woman's Christian Temperance Union, and

Mrs. Lilian M. N. Stevens, President National Woman's Christian Temperance Union.

Will you notify your local press as to your action, and also notify Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton, of Warren, Ohio.

[girlactionfigure]

Baruch Dayan HaEmet

This was 24 year old Sgt. First Class (res.) Elkana Newlander, a combat medic in the 99th Division from Efrat who was killed in action in Gaza 

May his memory be for a blessing

[attemptedvictorian]

The thing about The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton is that every decision and every move was made under the microscope society placed over you. Newland convinced Ellen not to get a divorce because of the scandal, and married May because it was the “safer” choice. There was talk about everyone no matter what they did.

But the thing is, twenty years later at the end of the novel, it was made a point that no one cared anymore. Their society was so surface-level and arbitrary that things that looked like massive scandals that would be remembered for generations literally meant nothing twenty years later.

[offender42085]

Post 1333

"....kinda real and yet kinda cheesy -- some of us laughed and cheered -- like something you would see in a made-for-TV movie." -- Fellow Inmate

Kevin Wayne Newland, Washington inmate 311751, born 1986, incarceration intake September 2007 at age 21, killed in an escape attempt June 2011

Murder, Possession of Stolen Property, Theft, Fogery

The attempted prison break in June 2011 occurred at the Clallam Bay Corrections Center, located in the remove northwest corner of Washington state on the Olympic Peninsula. Inside the facility’s garment shop, where about 70 inmates typically work making offender uniforms and coveralls. The prisoners were supervised by two unarmed corrections officers and a handful of civilian staff members, who are also trained in responding to prison emergencies.

While one of the two corrections officers was on a lunch break, two inmates – convicted murderer Kevin Newland and Dominick Maldonado put their plan into action.

Maldonado had been sentenced to a term of 163 years for attempted mass murder at a shopping center in 2005.

Maldonado grabbed the unarmed officer and held him hostage with a pair of scissors readily available in the garment shop, while Newland took keys from the guard, unlocked a forklift and rammed it through a rollup door.

Newland ignored verbal commands and a warning shot before an officer shot him, wherein shortly thereafter Maldonado released his hostage after seeing his partner killed.

Officials were quick to emphasize that it was standard procedure for there to be one officer on duty in the garment shop while the other took a lunch break. They also said the presence of the civilian staff, who train offenders in the garment industry, mitigated the officer’s absence.

As part of the investigation, an inmate who was working in the factory at the time described the events "as kinda real and yet kinda cheesy -- some of us laughed and cheered -- like something you would see in a made-for-TV movie."

When the attack occurred, the civilian employee in the vicinity tried to intervene physically, saw that he had little chance of success and quickly acted to alert prison officials. “If you would have had two corrections officers, it would have been a stronger response, but the civilian correctional industry workers responded very well,” an official said.

A union spokesman representing the state’s corrections officers and civilian Correctional Industries workers, said the civilian worker involved was repeatedly punched by Newland. Even after he broke free, Newland chased him down and beat him again before he was able to summon help.

Typically, corrections officers assigned to areas where prisoners live and work are unarmed, due to concerns that inmates might be able to take the weapons. Other officers, such as those assigned to special response teams, do carry guns.

Shortly after being convicted in 2007, Newland was linked to an attempted escape from the Spokane County Jail. In the common area of the jail, Guards found braided sheets fashioned into a rope, a shirt made into a slipknot and a sharpened wooden object. 

Before his incarceration, Newland had a career and love of breaking horses.

Newland was serving a sentence of 45 years.

Citing "ongoing safety/security concerns", the Washington State Department of Corrections transferred Maldonado (Federal Inmate 02071-122) to ADX Florence in Colorado in May 2016.

4o

[pemberlaey]

defending may welland is a full time job but someone has to do it

[annebrontesrequiem]

Can you do more takes about May Welland?

I would love to! Though I should warn you I don't have my copy of the Age of Innocence on me right now, so I'll probably missing one or two things I thought of while reading it.

I guess the first take is that I think Newland is an incredibly unreliable narrator. I realize that Wharton was certainly criticizing the life of American high society, and that May Welland is not meant to be a perfect character. I daresay she's not supposed to be that particularly likeable either (though she is my favorite character amongst the lot of them). But I think Wharton also turns her critique against Newland, and the way that May is treated is a pretty good indicator of it.

Newland thinks that May is innocent, so much so that he becomes annoyed with her by the end of it. He constantly uses May's conventionality as a way of justifying his infatuation with Ellen. But he never actually tries to make May smarter, though he claims to want to improve her at the beginning of the book. He never communicates his wants to her, never really asks what she might want out of the marriage. He blames her for things that he saw in her when they were courting and still dragged her to the aisle.

I believe May's character indicates that she would not be unhappy in a different marriage. She is after all a product of New York Society. She fights for Newland after it the question of their courtship has been cemented, and then of course after their married. But by then any breaking would be incredibly scandalous - something May realizes while Newland does not, cause he's an idiot. I don't think May needs Newland, regardless of the way Newland may think himself so superior to her. And I think in this Newland's egotism and weakness is revealed. He pretends to be above New York Society, when he is as much a part of it as May, even if he's playing a different part. Something that he realizes at the very end. So yeah, May is critical to understanding that Newland Archer is not your friend, and is not in fact as smart as he think she is.

I also think that May is smarter than Ellen, and I think in some ways she's more interesting, more compelling. Not that Ellen doesn't have her dramatic plots points, her husband, her affair, her strangeness. Ellen is beyond the pale, and that makes her interesting. But is May Welland not interesting in her own right?

Moreever, is she not much more complicated, more morally grey even. May Welland is unafraid to manipulate the situation when it benefits her. We see this plainly when she tells Ellen she's pregnant before she's really sure. And like, I love that for her but that's also a little evil. It's easy to see May in her sereneness as a victim of the situation and an angel. But she is an active player in this drama, albeit more behind the scenes. She knows Society and its norms are on her side. She exploits that. Ellen pretends, to me, to be really upset about May. Ellen may indeed feel guilty over the whole thing. But her motives are painfully obvious. And she follows through on her desires in a very open, straightforward way. It is because of this that she, for all purposes, loses. And May wins. And May does not win through goodness. May wins through an act of extreme cynicism. And is there no better reflection of New York high society than this?

I'm sure there's more but this post is already so long. I always love talking about May Welland, and I hope you enjoyed my thoughts!!

[wulfhalls]

anyway. may clocking newlands broke bitch ass behaviour immediately and baby trapping him thru ellen is so. I love u I love u I love u babygirl 👑😍💅