The Forsyte Saga; by John Galsworthy.

When it was published it was revolutionary in the theme - a woman is not owned by her husband, and love is not a duty she owes but a bond that is very real however intangible, that cannot be faked.

A theme from this recurs in another writer's work, where an architect designs a house for a woman he is deeply, desperately in love with, who happens to be then married to another woman. It is of course far more beautifully treated here, though not with the facile happy ending of the later work. But then there is bound to be a difference between great works of art and those of propaganda or illustration of a philosophy.