I shall be looking at Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, published in 1920, and Poor Things by Alasdair Gray, published in 1992. Below is a brief synopsis of Age of Innocence; Newland Archer is engaged to May Welland, but when Countess Ellen Olenska comes back from a disastrous marriage, Archer and Olenska are attracted to one another, and by the code of conduct of New York society Archer decides to end this love affair with Ellen …showed first 75 words of 395 total…

…showed last 75 words of 395 total…time periods. In Age of Innocence the society in which the Archer Newland lives prevent him from doing as he pleases without being persecuted and being an outcast. In Poor Things the limitation is not so much science, but others perception of what Baxter has done that is morally wrong, and his limitation is his physical attributes. So generally the characterization is similar in that they are moulded by society's thinking, illustrating the same constraints.