Introduction. Morals and manners
American roots and rootlessness
Priestess of reason. The strain of looking up
Bohemians and other aberrations
Darwinian descent and dissent
Spiritual homelessness. Prosaic and ideal in 'The house of mirth'
Calvinist Tortures. Out of religious fashion
Defeated lives in 'Ethan Frome'
Fragile freedoms. Seeking Sophia in 'The reef'
Whitman's song in 'Summer'
Returning home for "good"
Platonic idealism. Puritan hellenism in 'The age of innocence'
Catholicism: fulfillment or concession? More than and observer
Augustinian allusion in 'Hudson River bracketed' and 'The gods arrive'
Becoming a man; remaining a woman.
