Foreword and apology -- Family background -- Parents -- Boyhood scene -- Beacon Street and school days -- Revealing memories -- Harvard days -- Interlude -- Europe -- Law school -- Marriage -- Achievement -- Problems -- Added burdens -- Pequod Island days -- Portrait of a gentleman -- Parenthood and bird lore -- Solitude -- Harvard again, and England -- War days -- War strikes home -- William Apley -- Parent's vigil -- Son at the front -- Broken barriers -- New impacts -- Turbulent twenties -- Crisis -- Ring in the new -- Last pilgrimage -- House in order

Featuring a new introduction, this contemporary satire of turn-of-the-century Boston, which was awarded the Pulitizer Prize for Fiction in 1938, traces the life of George Apley, a wealthy businessman who sacrifices his individuality to social custom and tradition