The+main+idea

The main idea of the novel Reschikova Ksenia

Set in England and Hong Kong in the 1920s, The Painted Veil is the story of the beautiful but love-starved Kitty Fane. When her husband discovers her adulterous affair, he forces her to accompany him to the heart of a cholera epidemic. Kitty is a beautiful young woman, raised by her shallow and socially aggressive mother to be equally shallow and ambitious. In spite of her beauty, Kitty finds herself unmarried at the age of 25 and losing her place as her mother's beloved when her much younger and less attractive sister, Doris, becomes engaged to a baron. Embarrassed by her sister's superior match, desperate to leave the disappointed glare of her mother and panicked that another decent offer won't come her way, she says "yes" to Walter Fane, a bacteriologist working in Hong Kong, whom she barely knows. They marry and she accompanies him to Hong Kong where she finds herself bored, ambivalent and unmoved by her husband's love for her. Quickly, she falls in love and begins an affair with Charles Townsend, a handsome, suave politician who, like her, views life as a shallow thing to be lived as selfishly as possible. When Walter discovers their relationship, he coldly gives her an ultimatum: accompany him to inland China where there is a cholera outbreak or he will cause a scandal and divorce her (this was written in 1925 when an affair such as this would, indeed, be an actual scandal) unless Townsend will agree to divorce his own wife and marry her within the week. Predictably, to all except Kitty, Townsend's true colors appear and he disappoints her. Disillusioned and actually afraid of her husband who she believes only wants to kill her, she travels inland and her deeper, more understanding, more aware life begins. The title comes from the English poet, Shelly's, sonnet, "Lift Not The Painted Veil Which Those Who Live/Call Life." As Kitty is a front-row witness to death, she observes the veil that lifts when life leaves a body several times. Most poetically is her own veil, lifted to experience a life so different from the superficial one she had expected. The Painted Veil is a beautifully written affirmation of the human capacity to grow, to change, and to forgive.