Lilies, Dandelions, and the Price of Privilege: Wharton’s The House of Mirth and Kohan’s Orange Is the New Black

This article examines the overlooked intertextual parallels between Edith Wharton’s The House of Mirth and Jenji Kohan’s hit Netflix series Orange Is the New Black. While HoM is never explicitly referenced in OITNB, many of the most prominently featured books read by inmates are novels of manners that, despite their disparities in setting with Litchfield Penitentiary, serve to remind viewers of the prison’s seemingly endless catalog of social codes. This article contends that like Lily Bart in HoM, OITNB’s Piper Chapman is forced to navigate a hostile environment structured by rigid social hierarchies where even a single misplaced gesture can carry life-altering consequences. Both women become ensnared in systems of social transaction that test their agency and resilience; however, their fates diverge in telling ways. Lily’s refusal to leverage her social capital for a more secure societal standing leads to her isolation and death, while Piper’s willingness to utilize her assets enables her to subsist in the carceral system. Ultimately, an intertextual reading of HoM and OITNB reveals the latent brutality of hierarchical power structures while illustrating that survival rests not on moral integrity but on pragmatic adaptability.