Fidelity by Susan Glaspell

Fidelity Reviews

• 
  Jane

  I knew little of Susan Glaspell when I put this book on my Classics Club list; just that two of her books had been republished by Persephone and that she was both a novelist and a dramatist.
  
  That was reason enough.
  
  The opening of this book told me that she was mistress of each art.
  
  In Freeport, a small town in Iowa, an old man was gravely ill. He was asking for his daughter and his numbers wondered if she would dare to come home. She had left town in the wake of a terrible scandal. She hadn’t come home when her mother died, and that hardened the widely held opinion that she wasn’t the nice girl had thought she was; that she was a selfish, manipulative woman who shouldn’t be allowed in decent society. But if she was ever to come back surely this was the time.
  
  Amy Frankin, the doctor’s wife, was a newcomer to the town and she had no idea what her new friends were talking about, or what disgraceful thing Ruth Holland had done. She would learn that Ruth had fallen in love with a married man, and that, when his health had broken down and his doctor suggest a change of climate, they had left town and set up home together in Colorado.
  
  Ruth Holland was coming home, and she was well aware that it wouldn’t be easy.
  
  “It was over the pain and the sweetness of life that this woman—Ruth Holland—brooded during the two days that carried her back to the home of her girlhood. She seemed to be going back over a long bridge. That part of her life had been cut away from her. With most lives the past grew into the future; it was as a growth that spread, the present but the extent of the growth at the moment. With her there had been the sharp cut; not a cut, but a tear, a tear that left bleeding ends. Back there lay the past, a separated thing. During the eleven years since her life had been torn from that past she had seen it not only as a separate thing but a thing that had no reach into the future. The very number of miles between, the fact that she made no journeys back home, contributed to that sense of the cleavage, the remoteness, the finality. Those she had left back there remained real and warm in her memory, but her part with them was a thing finished. It was as if only shoots of pain could for the minute unite them.”
  
  She wasn’t aware – but she would learn – was that her behaviour had caused terrible problems for her family. That so many things she had said and done would be re-evaluated and misunderstood after her departure. And that friends and neighbours would still say that what she had done was beyond the pale and turn their backs on her.
  
  Deane Franklin, the town doctor, supported her. They had been close friends and he had helped her to when she needed to keep her relationship secret, he had listened when she needed someone to talk to. Amy couldn’t understand why her husband was still drawn to another woman, why his view of what had happened was so different to her friends’ views, or why he would make himself complicit in such a scandalous situation
  
  “I do know a few things. I know that society cannot countenance a woman who did what that woman did. I know that if a woman is going to selfishly take her own happiness with no thought of others she must expect to find herself outside the lives of decent people. Society must protect itself against such persons as she. I know that much—fortunately.”
  
  Susan Glaspell tells her story beautifully. The pace is stately; the perspectives shift; and she moves between a traditional third-person narrative and more modern visits to her characters’ thoughts. There was complexity, there there was detail, and yet there was always such clarity of thought and purpose.
  
  I found it easy to be drawn into the world she created, and to believe that these people lived and breathed, that the events and incidents I read about really happened.
  
  I could see where the suthor’s sympathies lay, but I appreciated that she had understanding and concern for all of her characters and their different views.
  
  I loved the telling of the story, and I loved its emotional depth.
  
  The title of this book was very well chosen. It is underpinned by the question of who or what we owe fidelity. Our spouses? The standards of society? Our families? To the lover with whom we’ve aligned? Or our selves?
  
  There are no easy answers, but the asking of the question allowed Susan Glaspell to make a wonderful exploration of the possibilities and the problems that it presents.
  
  A conversation with an old school-mate – a girl who had came from a much poorer background that Ruth and her friends and had not had an easy life – gives Ruth food for thought and helps her to face the future.
  
  “It’s what we think that counts, Ruth. It’s what we feel. It’s what we are. Oh, I’d like richer living—more beauty—more joy. Well, I haven’t those things. For various reasons, I won’t have them. That makes it the more important to have all I can take!”—it leaped out from the gentler thinking like a sent arrow. “Nobody holds my thoughts. They travel as far as they themselves have power to travel. They bring me whatever they can bring me—and I shut nothing out. I’m not afraid!”
  
  This is a story set in a particular time and place, the world has changed a great deal in more than a hundred years since it was written, and yet it still has the power to touch hearts and minds.
  
  The questions it asks would need to be asked differently today, but they are as important now as they were then.
• 
  Mary Durrant

  A wonderful thought provoking book.
  Ruth leaves town with a married man in the early 1900's coming back eleven years later when her father is dying.
  I was drawn into this book with the plight of Ruth and how she must have felt leaving her family and life behind.
  Deane who loved her has now married Amy but all is not well which results in Amy leaving her Husband and going back to her family.
  It's not only Ruth that has suffered but the wife that was left behind and when after all those years she agrees to a divorce Ruth no longer wants marriage and leaves for a life of her own in New York.
  Hard to believe this was written a hundred years ago as it could so have been written today.
  Another excellent read from Persephone books.
• 
  Michael

  "Love was the great and beautiful wonder - but surely one should not stay with it in the place where it found one. Why, loving should light the way! Far from engulfing all the rest of life it seemed now that love should open life to one. Whether one kept it or whether one lost it, it failed if it did not send one farther along the way. She had been afraid to think of her love changing because that had seemed to grant that it had failed. But now it seemed that it failed if it did not leave her bigger than it had found her. [Ruth's] eyes filled in response to the stern beauty of that. Not that one should stay with love in the same place, but rather the meaning of it all was in just this: that it should send one on."
  
  Adored this novel. It reminded me of Main Street by Sinclair Lewis a bit just in terms of it being about a woman in a small town with narrow minded people. Ruth was such an endearing character and I loved watching her grow as a person and deal with the choices she made years down the line. Wonderful ending, too. Will be looking for more by Susan Glaspell!
• 
  Jessica

  This is one of the few books I actually think about from time to time even long after finishing reading it. It's about a young woman in turn of the (previous) century Iowa who embarks on an affair with a married man and the fallout of that decision, but it's not what you might think. Written in 1915, it's an incredibly sensitive and honest portrait of family, community and womanhood that has a very contemporary feel. I'm surprised Susan Glaspell isn't better known as a novelist. Where Edith Wharton has the ability to perfectly capture a character's psychology, Glaspell is able to capture their souls. In my book, Fidelity is an American classic.
• 
  Margaret

  Fidelity is a forgotten classic, an early 20th-century novel (reprinted by the marvelous Persephone Books) about a Midwest woman who defies the rules of society to run away with her lover. The structure is intricate yet easily followed, beginning as Ruth comes home to be with her sick father and then using flashbacks to show how events unfolded in the past. Though her sympathies (and thus the reader's) are clearly with Ruth, Glaspell is careful to show every side of the story, how Ruth's decision affected her family and friends as well as herself; there are no easy answers here.
• 
  Rosemary

  It's 1914, and Ruth Holland is coming back to her father's deathbed in the small American town that she fled with a married man over 10 years earlier. We hear how the affair came about, how love swept away all other considerations at the time, and how the consequences rippled out, not only for the "guilty" pair but for their families and friends.
  
  Ruth certainly suffers for her decision to leave town with the married Stuart Williams, but so do many other people, as she only fully realises all these years later. She has to ask herself, even if it was worth it for her, was it worth all that pain for others?
  
  Susan Glaspell's view seems to be that society shouldn't be so critical of infidelity--but given that it was (the book was published in 1915), perhaps it was only a truly great love that could justify throwing everything over. And did Ruth and Stuart have that or not? Should we judge by our feelings at the time, or can we only know with hindsight? The novel raises these questions but leaves it to the reader to decide.
• 
  Liina

  A very weak three. I was infuriated by the narrow minded "talk" of the town and how it ruined everyones lives. The blurb about it says that it is about how the main characters infidelity did that but clearly it was not she who caused all the accompanying pain but the people who judged her. I do understand that it is set in 1900's and that kind of attitude was normal then. I generally like old fashioned books but this was beyond my limit and a bit too one dimensional. The love story that caused all the drama in the book was never discussed in detail which robbed the seriousness from it and I didn't feel for the characters although they all really suffered.
• 
  Tania

  The story of Ruth, who leaves her social circle to run away with a married man. Years later, her Father is dying so she comes back to town to be with him in his last days. it is only on her return that she fully realises the impact of her decision all those years ago. Was it worth it? It is up to the reader to decide the answer, though the author was surprisingly sensitive to Ruth, especially considering the time this was written (1915)
  
  I did find it dragged a little bit for me in places, and while I enjoyed it, I didn't find it very compelling. We read a lot about the various characters thoughts on respectability, society and fidelity, but I found these passages a bit meandering, other readers may appreciate these musings more than I did, (I may have appreciated them more at a different time).
• 
  Jane

  SPOILER ALERT;
  
  I tried, I really tried. About 3/4 of the way through, I finally had enough. I think Glaspell writes well, but I found much to dislike. Over and over again, we are instructed that love is all that counts and the highest good. You might destroy other people's happiness but you are being true to yourself! Severed relationships with friends and your parents and siblings - just plow ahead and go your way. The heroine weeps all the time but always come back to the feeling of self justification.
  
  Her destructive ways continue from the moment she returns home as she draws others to what is almost a cause - free yourself from all constraints! I found it shallow and sort of appalling. Quite often those that disagree with her actions are depicted as puritanical and cartoonish. I think Ruth's original decision could have made for an absorbing read had there been a deeper treatment of responsibility vs. freedom. By championing Ruth at every turn, I think the author made an error. It made her not very interesting.
• 
  Mehr Ra

  I did not like this novel at all, it is too watery and sentimental and not thought provoking as some say, in my opinion, it is a bunch of theorizing, very second rate, it belongs to the era when women thought not sticking to the classic role of women as faithful wives and kind mothers and benevolent daughters is fashionable, the character is neither of these roles, and nothing more either, she is not a woman of science, nor of art nor of profession, she is not educated, she is just an unfaithful member of any family who insists she is faithful to her own heart! and that is enough for her, as it seems.
  I would not recommend it, I think Glaspell is a better playwright than a novelist
• 
  Helen Day

  Beautifully written, brilliant, and unapologetically feminist to boot. One of those rare novels I find myself underlining passages and dog-earing pages to re-read later.
• 
  Patrick

  There’s something unassuming about the simple grey dust covers that wrap each one of the books published by Persephone. It is a handsome look, projecting a confident uniformity; reminiscent of the green or orange spines of Penguin paperbacks, though a bit more austere. There’s no way in which you can sum up the contents with a glance, as is the intent of so much in the way of modern glossy cover photography.
  
  And so when you start reading a book like 'Fidelity' by Susan Glaspell, it’s startling just how bold it feels when there’s so little to shape your initial expectations of what lies between those grey covers. The opening chapter is gentle, with all the airy elegance of a nineteenth century novel, as if it were pretending to be a story concerned for social airs and graces; but it soon switches perspective to something rich, passionate, and entirely of its time; something which reveals itself to be entirely preoccupied with skewering such a limited view of life.
  
  The story concerns the life of Ruth Holland, a woman who becomes notorious in her small American town of Freeport for having an affair with a married man, Stuart Williams. Initially, we learn about this through a mixture of reminiscence and flashback from the perspective of Deane, the local doctor (and one of her few remaining friends). But then we switch to the present day, where Ruth must return to Freeport now that her father is dying. She is forced into contact with her siblings — half of whom still resent her for what she did to their family name — and with her childhood friend Edith, who refuses to accept her back into society.
  
  Ruth and Stuart have both become pariahs in Freeport, but the reader is left in little doubt that things are worse for Ruth. Few people, with the exception of Deane and her brother Ted, think it at all strange that she should find it effectively impossible to live an ordinary life there. The claim of those who exclude her is that the boundaries of society must be protected from people who would try to break them down. But the novel’s contention is that those boundaries are worthless if the sacrifice they require is rooted in the subjugation of human feeling.
  
  There are two basic modes to the prose of 'Fidelity': one which mimics the high Jane Austen style of narrowly omniscient narration, with a peppering of irony; the other which is a more impressionistic, intimate affair, that follows certain characters very closely. Though there’s a fine eye for detail, concrete description is sparse throughout; I couldn’t begin to tell you what Ruth or Deane looked like, for example. It seems the author was more concerned with the expression of their inner lives than painting pictures with words.
  
  Perhaps that’s what is ultimately most compelling about its style. It feels like something that, on publication in 1915, would have seemed absolutely modern without in the least bit modernist. The writing itself is quite plain, though still prone to long, conversational sentences and knotty sub-clauses. Glaspell was well known as a playwright — she won a Pulitzer for Drama in 1931 — and certainly there’s a few sequences here which could be transferred to the stage without much trouble. But the best moments are those which occur entirely within a character’s mind.
  
  ‘…That this girl, whom she had forgotten, should welcome her so warmly stirred an old wondering: a wondering if somewhere in the world there were not people who would be her friends. That wondering, longing, had run through many lonely days. The people she had known would no longer be her friends. But were there not other people? She knew so little about the world outside her life; her own life had seemed to shut down around her…
  
  …After she had several times been hurt by the drawing away of people whom she had grown to like, she herself drew back where she could not be so easily hurt. And so it came about that her personality changed in that; from an outgoing nature she came to be one who held back, shut herself in. Even people who had never ‘heard’ had the feeling she did not care to know them, that she had wanted to be left alone. It crippled her power for friendship; it hurt her spirit. And it left her very much alone. In that loneliness she wondered if there were not other people — people who could ‘hear’ and not draw away. She had not found them; perhaps she had at times been near them, and in her holding back — not knowing, afraid — had let them go by. Of that, too, she had wondered; there had been many lonely wonderings….’
  
  It’s a sort of soliloquising which has little in common with what would come to be known as ‘stream of consciousness’ in fiction. It’s sensitive, but there’s a hard edge to it, almost like a newspaper editorial on the state of this woman’s psyche. In its immediacy it reminds me of those great Edwardian novelists of rich interiors. There’s Henry James and Edith Wharton here, but also Joseph Conrad and Ford Madox Ford. That said, at bottom this is nothing like 'Lord Jim' or 'The Good Soldier' — there is nothing especially tricky about 'Fidelity'. This is a solid, well-built work of realistic fiction. Rather than confounding the reader with the mysteries of human nature, it seems the author is trying to make something plain something they felt all too clearly.
  
  The ending is a curious one. The story can’t quite figure out to resolve itself within the confines of Freeport society. Ruth isn’t permitted to win, of course, and it seems impossible that the world might change in ways that would favour her. And yet it ends on a note of almost triumphant optimism. It settles on a picture that has been building up throughout the book: a strong woman, alone, and happy in her aloneness. Perhaps it is better to light out for the territory on one’s own; for a woman in 1915 to decide to live by herself would have seemed like a revolutionary gesture. But in terms of what we see, that journey never goes much further than the first few steps. The implications of Ruth’s final decision aren’t considered beyond that — but then the advantage of a book is that you can always fall back on the breezy confidence of the open road.
• 
  Pat

  Fidelity by Susan Glaspell.
  This is a wonderfully well-written book with complex rounded characters who draw you in to the story by the insight you get into their deepest thought, or lack of them. You can’t fail to identify with the ideas that are debated by the book because you are carried along by the subtlety with which characters inner thoughts are revealed.
  At the center of this novel is Ruth Holland who shocks middle-class society in the small Iowa town of Freeport by running away with a married man. In 1915 the schoolmate, Dr. Deane Franklin, whose love for her was not returned but who was nonetheless her closest friend has recently married a younger woman, Amy, whose entrance into Freeport society is marred, she feels, by finding out that her new husband still defends, Ruth, who has “lived in sin” for eleven years and is so rejected by local society that her name is normally never mentioned. Through this story Glaspell draws a detailed and somewhat harrowing picture of the way in which the lives of this circle of young women are hemmed in and circumscribed by rules of propriety enforced by the fear of being cast out of the safety net of acceptance and inclusion in this self-important clique.
  Glaspell is able to take us into the minds of her characters in such a subtle and sensitive way that we not only come to understand what they think and feel but also how those thoughts and feelings develop. The author particularly focuses on the nature and importance of love in all its manifestations. Through Deane she expresses the belief that true friendship is complex and involves listening, understanding sometimes, and sacrifice of one’s own needs. When Ruth returns in her thirties to visit her dying father the novel then begins to explore very basics of feminism, the right of women to pursue self- realization through friendships that grow with other `outsiders.’ It is almost a primer on feminism which I would recommend to your women and men to show them that no matter far we have come there is still a way to go to get rid of the destructive power of `difference.’
  
  
  
• 
  Trisha

  This is one of several beautifully printed books I've ordered from London's Persephone Books (another example of why I can't imagine ever using a kindle or e-book!!!) I would never have discovered it had it not been for the fact that Persephone Books only prints lesser-known, but well worth reading, older books written throughout the past 150 years by women. Susan Glaspell is one such writer and her book was set in the early 20th century in Davenport, Iowa, the town where she herself had grown up. It's a remarkable book for several reasons. For one thing its central character isn't bound by the rules and conventions that dictated how women were supposed to live and behave during that era. Instead she leaves her family and friends to elope with the man she loves, even though it means leaving behind what would have been a comfortable and secure life with the young, up and coming doctor who could have given her the kind of lifestyle she was accustomed to. The book is structured in such a way as to introduce the reader to the various characters who are effected by Ruth's decision and how their small-town, hypocritical notions about "society" have trapped them in a way of life that is dictated by rigid norms and superficial values. Having had grandparents who lived in a small Iowa town and would have belonged to Ruth's generation, it was fascinating to speculate that they probably would have been right at home in that world. Most likely they would have judged Ruth and what she did in much the same way as the fictional characters did in this very well written book.
  
  
• 
  Marion

  Susan Glaspell must be one of the greatest unknown writers in history. She was a Pulitzer Prize winning playwright and author of several novels and short stories. Yet, her name and work are little known today.
  
  I first became aware of Susan Glaspell when I googled best American female authors. Then, in a short story discussion group that I attend, we read "A Jury of her Peers." I was blown away and decided to read more from this great writer.
  
  "Fidelity" is a novel set in Iowa in 1900-1913. Ruth Holland is a young girl who wants to experience life at it fullest. She becomes involved with a married man whose wife refuses to divorce him. Ruth runs way with this man but returns many years later when her aging father is on his deathbed. She finds that she has been shunned by all of "polite" society in her hometown. All but one of her former friends refuse to have anything to do with her.
  
  The novel was first published in 1915. I found the dialogue to be a bit dated, but the message and themes of the book remain vividly relevant today. I found myself considering many aspects of the concept of fidelity: fidelity in marriage, fidelity of friends, fidelity to a rigid, restrictive sense of morality, and even fidelity to oneself.
  
  I loved this book and would wholeheartedly recommend it.
• 
  Sophia

  What an interesting, insightful book! I've never heard of it, but saw it here on Goodreads and found it for free on Kindle.
  
  This is about a young woman in a small town around the turn of the last century who falls in love and runs off with a married man. Most of the story takes place 11 years later, when she returns to the town because her father is dying. The book sensitively explores the effect her actions had on her family, herself, her friends, even the wife left behind. The passages discussing the emotions of returning home after being away and estranged were beautiful and rang true.
  
  I found this book very moving. It also has an interesting feminist angle.
• 
  Carol Tilley

  As much a portrait of small town society as it is the main character Ruth, who "wants more life" and new things. I found it engaging and gave me insights into my own small town upbringing
• 
  Vanessa

  Fidelity follows Ruth Holland, a young woman who runs away with a married man to the shame of her family and friends back home, and when she returns around 10 years later to attend to her dying father, she begins to fully comprehend how her actions have affected those closest to her. And in a way this book isn't so much about the idea of fidelity, as it is a critique on the institution of marriage itself.
  
  This was a really interesting read, mainly because I had so many conflicting feelings while reading it, and this is mainly due to personal opinions on the subject matter. The writing is very sentimental and internal throughout the novel, with long drawn-out sections of wistfulness on various characters' parts, wondering on the true meaning of love, the true meaning of friendship, what is owed to someone and how society expects you to respond to certain things. Ultimately though the narrative is one where we are meant to feel sorry for Ruth, and see how unfairly maligned she is by the people she used to hold dear. I take some issue with that, because at the end of the day Ruth knowingly went away with another woman's husband, and my own personal feelings on cheating are that I am completely against it. However, I feel like Ruth is still a sympathetic character in that she sacrifices everything for love, when she knows it will affect her ten times worse than Stuart who she leaves with. Stuart to me was a bit of a deplorable character - it was his wife, no matter how unloving, that he left, and yet no one in their town critiques him at any given moment. The hatred is all directed at Ruth, and it is her family who ultimately suffer. So mixed feelings is putting it lightly.
  
  The whole concept of divorce, and the sanctity given to marriage is also very interesting, and I imagine that at the time this was published (1915) Glaspell's take on the subject would have been somewhat controversial. The focus is so much on the self and what an individual wants that I imagine it would have gone against everything people felt about marriage and its importance at the time - I would have loved to be a fly on the wall to see peoples' reactions when this was published. I find Glaspell's approach really fresh and interesting, and I liked the fact that she showed perspectives from many characters so we really felt in their shoes. The character of Deane Franklin, Ruth's best friend, in particular was very interesting because we see his obsession with validating Ruth alongside the tensions it causes between him and his new wife. I feel like her character was unlikable but perhaps a bit unfairly treated due to the specific nature of her surroundings and circumstances, but that might just be my opinion. I just found every single character to be grey in this novel, with pros and cons to them, and I found myself siding with them and against them all simultaneously.
  
  I think the main thing that drags this book down for me though isn't so much the conflict it brings up in terms of how to feel about the characters, but by the long-winded and musing nature of the writing style. Glaspell was sometimes a bit too flowery for my liking, and she could say the same thing in about half the words more often than not. I found many sections to be quite repetitive, and although I was never bored as such, I did feel like I was ready to move on from those moments. But overall I'm glad I read this, it's definitely a very different type of narrative from any I've read before from Persephone, and if it sounds at all appealing I'd say it's still worth a try.
• 
  Sarah

  “…that new quiet, that new force within was beginning to make for new thinking. She had thought much about what she had lived through—she could not help doing that, but she was thinking now with new questionings. She had not questioned much; she had accepted.”
  
  I adored this book! Glaspell has such a unique ability to capture emotions and feelings in a way that is painful yet beautiful. I felt seen in such a unique way and am amazed at how that can happen through a book published over a century ago. It is worth the time to do a little research about Glaspell’s life and the cultural context at the time she was writing (published in 1915). While not necessary, that information will enhance the reading experience.
• 
  Shatterlings

  This book was first published in 1915, I can imagine it was a pretty bold story then, with its central tale of adultery and its female empowering. The men are slightly bland and besides the point, it’s the women this is about. Some of them escape societies rules and some don’t, it’s very clear whose side the author is on. The prose is a little over the top in parts, but some parts are also very much page turners.
• 
  RoxAnne

  I was made aware of this book by a fellow knitter who saw the book by an Iowa author in a bookstore in The Netherlands. As an avid reader and Iowan, I jumped at the chance to read this obscure book. It is a very philosophical book about Ruth who fell in love with a married man and ran away with him. She was scorned by ‘society’ and paid the price. A fellow classmate, Deane, is her best friend throughout her life. She comes home during the last days of her father’s life and finds that nothing has changed. The townspeople still shun her but she does connect with a new friend (old schoolmate) that accepts her for who she is. The book goes into extensive detail about these lives and how they both end up discovering their true selves. I liked the book but the author is very wordy.
• 
  Angelina Pattavina

  This book could have been half it's length. But to each their own ig
• 
  Phoebe Mogharei

  absolutely love a good novel about shame
• 
  Literary Lass

  
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  Dissecting fidelity on all levels – romantic, friendship, family. How much influence does society hold over our decisions to buck societal expectations versus our own authentic happiness. Our actions trickle over, hurting others to an extent unknown as Ruth discovers her trail of pain took hostages. You will find yourself contemplating as you drift along with the narrative.
  
  Ruth being the voice of the marital interloper added dimension and texture to her story. Allegiances tested, forgiveness a gift, we learn fidelity is a slippery slope as peer pressure governs for the majority. Those willing to remain loyal and forgiving sacrifice in the name of love and friendship as the community disapproves, even Ruth’s family is divided over her actions and homecoming. A poignant story of a woman desperate to find her place in the world after selecting a controversial fork in the road, the aftermath is taxing and messy but courageously navigated to find oneself.
  
  Great book, no doubt ahead of its time with content written in a challenging era. I appreciate a narrative exploring moral and societal issues. Fabulous book, Ruth is both frustrating and empathetic, understood and misunderstood.
  
• 
  Jean Carlton

  Published in 1915, the New York Times called it "a big and real contribution to American novels." and yet I had never heard of the book (or her) until I came across a recommendation some time ago to read "A Jury of her Peers".
  The concepts and their many implications are very thought provoking. A young woman (early 20th century) chooses to go off with an (older) married man. What are the consequences not only to herself but to her family and loved ones? Scorned more in that era than would be true today, still the idea of the far reaching effects in making choices for yourself certainly can be considered in other situations. A view from the 'other' woman's perspective is unusual and revealing.The prose is a bit wordy/flowery but it is very readable and at over 400 pages (in paper copy) moves along well.
  I think it would be a good book club choice for a lively discussion.
  
  A prolific and honored writer in her time she is rather unknown today. I will read her other books. Read more about her at
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Gl...
  
  Ebook currently available for a free download for Kindle from Amazon. I got mine free from Guttenberg Press.
  
  
• 
  Louise

  Considering the problems that many young people are having today in some ethnic/religious groups, with living their own (love)lives without interfering/judging priests, aunts, parents etc. this is still very relevant. How considerations for norms and society can result in a lot of unhappy human beings - and who benefits from that?
  
  Interesting that Glaspell feels the need to describe Stuart's marriage as dead for 2 years before he begins his affair with Ruth - and suggest that he's had an affair earlier - wonder if that is to take some fault of Ruth's shoulders?
  
  Also interesting that Deane's wife Amy is described as a narrowminded person/ representative for society.
  
  I like this quote: she had let slip from her, like useless garments, all those blurring artificialities that keep people apart.
• 
  Romily

  I can understand why Persephone books chose this as one of their first reissues - 75 years after its first publication in 1915. To the modern reader it demonstrates the vast change in social attitudes in the ostracism of Ruth Holland for daring to love (and live with) a married man. However despite its somewhat overwrought style it is a powerful attempt to explore the individual's (and particularly a woman's) freedom to choose love over society and does not shirk from showing the consequences to others as well as oneself. The individual's overriding concern, the novelist appears to say, is to achieve and maintain fidelity to one's inner life - wherever this may lead one.
  The depiction of the society of the small mid-west American town is nuanced and clearly drawn from Glaspell's hometown of Davenport, Iowa, where her progressive ideas set her apart from the society matrons.
  
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  Emily

  Tipped off by a friend, I've recently been reading books that are reprinted by Persephone Books in London. They are reviving lost (and mainly female) authors from the interwar period. That's how I found this author. I can certainly see for the time period how the story and main character were quite unusual and forward thinking, perhaps even liberating and revolutionary, so I can appreciate that. However, reading the story almost 100 years after it was written, it doesn't seem that original or inspiring. Perhaps, that is one problem of the so-called "post-feminist era"-- we are not as celebratory of or impressed by those who paved the way so long ago (or what seems like so long ago).