Age of Innocence By the time the bloody chaos of the First World War finally came to an end on November 11, 1918, the American novelist Edith Wharton had already been living as an expatriate in Paris for five years. During that time, she had essentially ceased to write fiction and had turned her energies instead to the Allied effort by providing war relief for soldiers and refugees. Her devotion and enthusiasm for her work was, in …showed first 75 words of 1185 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1185 total…she is pregnant and that she told Ellen her news two weeks earlier. Twenty-five years pass. In that time, the Archers have had three children and May has died from pneumonia. Now Archer's son convinces him to travel to France. There, they arrange to visit the Countess Olenska at her Paris apartment. However, at the last minute Archer sends his son alone to visit her, content instead to live with his memories of the past.