The story takes place at the opening of a new century, one that held forth all kinds of promises, especially for women. In this post-Victorian Fifth Avenue milieu, Lily Bart, an unmarried woman of 29 with dwindling prospects, needs a husband badly. She lives beyond her means, relying on the grudging charity of her elderly aunt. She is the kind of girl who would make an admirable decoration on some fine gentleman's arm, but there is a liveliness--a knowingness--in her eyes that alarms potential suitors. Lily is unsuccessful in her search for a haven, because she values her emotional and financial independence. To her eternal sorrow, it is other women, the doyennes of high society, who obliquely, ruthlessly, keep that independence forever out of poor Lily's reach.