How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
[…] the girl received an expensive but incoherent education, which included "drawing from the model," a thing never dreamed of before, and playing the piano in quintets with professional musicians. (8.5)
For some characters, Ellen's unconventional education abroad (so artsy, so risqué) explains her behavior.
Quote #2
"[…] That's why I came home. I want to forget everything else, to become a complete American again, like the Mingotts and Wellands, and you and your delightful mother, and all the other good people here tonight […] " (8.30)
Ellen associates being American with goodness and simplicity. Little does she know how spiteful and manipulative some of her family members are… dun dun dun.
Quote #3
[…] what struck him was the way in which Medora Manson's shabby hired house, with its blighted background of pampas grass and Rogers statuettes, had, by a turn of the hand, and the skilful use of a few properties, been transformed into something intimate, "foreign," subtly suggestive of old romantic scenes and sentiments.
Ellen's attraction for Archer is her "foreign"-ness. She represents to him the world beyond New York society and its rigid rules.