Edith Wharton Books

For fans of Wharton's writings, Boswell furnishes a comprehensive analysis of the films made from them in the early 20th century. You probably should already be well acquainted with the books. Much of the commentary is meaningless without this, as Boswell rightly doesn't waste much time paraphrasing those books. Instead, she offers an understanding of Wharton as a person, in the interplay with the young Hollywood film industry.

Even then, there was a perception that writers might be treated as lesser personas in the industry. The book is well worth reading just as an insight into those early Hollywood years. The treatment of Wharton, and her view of Hollywood, would find echoes in the experiences of other famous writers, like Huxley.

Well, I am a 17 year old high schooler, and I just read "The Age of Innocence", I don't think people of my age should be reading this kind of books, most of my people in my English class didn't understand like half of the vocabulary, I personally didnt understand some of it. I wouldn't recommend this book to any young people, it involves lots of imaginary love scenes that I dont think people in my age understand.

In a way, Edith Wharton was at her best in her novellas -- her stories are lean, taut and emotionally deep. That's what "Summer" and "Ethan Frome" have in common, as they look at love, sex, marriage and the conventions of the 1800s. Put together, these novellas are utterly fascinating.

"Ethan Frome" is the male half of a loveless marriage, with the fretful, fussy Zeena. Then Zeena's lovely cousin Mattie Silver comes to live with them, and she brings out a happier, more passionate side of Ethan. But when Mattie is sent away, Ethan must make a decision. He knows he can't stay in his horrible marriage, so will he run away with Mattie? Or will something worse happen?

"Summer" shocked the 1917 public, with its frank-for-its-time look at a young woman's sexual awakening. It takes place in the New England village of North Dormer, where the young librarian Charity lives. But when Charity falls in love with an upper-class young rake named Lucius, she finds herself pregnant and unmarried -- a destructive combination in the 1900s.

Edith Wharton gave unvarnished looks at social conventions throughout her career -- she doesn't judge, she just tells it how it was, whether she's talking about the Roaring 20s or the uptight Victorian era. Divorce was almost unthinkable, affairs scandalous if revealed, and women had the cards stacked against them in matters of love, marriage and sex.

Both novellas also display Wharton's talent for writing characters who were totally unlike her, especially working-class heroes. Charity is an uneducated, naive, rough-mannered young woman, while Ethan is... well, male. Neither is much like Wharton, but she gets inside their heads and makes them entirely believable.

Wharton's formal writing style is offset by the starkness of her stories -- if she took a hard look at Victorian social conventions, she didn't flinch from showing what happened to those that transgressed. (I'll give you a hint -- neither novella has a smooching-lovers-ride-off-into-the-sunset finale) It's realistic, but a bit depressing.

"Summer" and "Ethan Frome" are both tales of love doomed by social conventions, and also two of Wharton's best stories. Sad and beautiful, gripping and classic.

In a way, Edith Wharton was at her best in her novellas -- her stories are lean, taut and emotionally striking.

And the novellas "Ethan Frome, Summer, Bunner Sisters" brings together three of her most powerful novellas, elongated short stories that explore love, morality, betrayal, the conventions of the time in women's live, and poverty. They're not just fascinating, but beautifully written.

"The Bunner Sisters" is one of Wharton's darkest stories, in which two timid sisters run a small, failing shop together. When Ann Eliza gives Evalina a gifts, they both become involved with the mysterious man, Ramy, who sold it to her. Ann Eliza attempts to sacrifice money and happiness for her sister's happiness, but neither knows what Ramy is hiding from them, or how it will destroy their lives.

"Ethan Frome" is the male half of a loveless marriage, with the fretful, fussy Zeena. Then Zeena's lovely cousin Mattie Silver comes to live with them, and she brings out a happier, more passionate side of Ethan. But when Mattie is sent away, Ethan must make a decision. He knows he can't stay in his horrible marriage, so will he run away with Mattie? The choice they make will affect all three lives.

"Summer" shocked the 1917 public, with its frank-for-its-time look at a young woman's sexual awakening. It takes place in the New England village of North Dormer, where the young librarian Charity lives. But when Charity falls in love with an upper-class young rake named Lucius, she finds herself pregnant and unmarried -- a destructive combination in the 1900s. There's only one respectable way out.

Edith Wharton gave unvarnished looks at social conventions throughout her career -- she doesn't judge, she just tells it how it was, whether she's talking about the Roaring 20s or the uptight Victorian era. Divorce was almost unthinkable, affairs scandalous if revealed, and women had the cards stacked against them in matters of love, marriage and sex.

So her works are even better when you set them in context, full of characters who were totally unlike her. Some were male, some timid and naive, some potentially disgraced, and some completely broken by society's dictates. Few of her characters are much like Wharton, but she gets inside their heads and makes them entirely believable.

Wharton's formal, often poetic writing style makes these stories all the richer. They're rich with light, smells, sounds and the swirl of nature, even in a city. But it's offset by the starkness of her stories -- if she took a hard look at hypocrises and social conventions, she didn't flinch from showing what happened to those that transgressed. It's realistic, but a bit depressing.

These three novellas are not easy reading -- each one is a powerful, harrowing story wrapped in Wharton's beautiful prose. Magnificent, but difficult.

When Lewis Raycie, at age twenty-one, is sent abroad for two years to "form his taste [and] fortify his judgment," his father gives him five thousand dollars to purchase fine art on his father's behalf. His father's tastes are those of his upperclass friends, unformed by personal interest or study, and he especially hopes that Lewis will acquire a Raphael, since Raphaels are in vogue among his friends. In Italy, however, Lewis purchases Italian "primitives" by Giotto, Piero Della Francesca, Mantegna, and Carpaccio, paintings he loves and which he believes will form a stunning foundation for his father's gallery.

Though Lewis has, in fact, "formed his taste and fortified his judgment," exactly what he was expected to do in his tour of Europe, his father is outraged when he sees these paintings, all by artists he considers inferior--he has never heard of them and none of his friends collect them--and Lewis is disinherited. The novella follows Lewis and his wife Treeshy as they deal with the personal and social consequences of Lewis's art purchases.

The first of Wharton's four "Old New York" novellas, set in ten-year intervals between 1840 and 1870, False Dawn is as careful in its depiction of the New York society of the 1840s as Wharton's more famous novels are of their (later) periods. The artificiality of society, its reliance on stultifying social conventions, and the penchant for social competition are vividly illustrated here, and these themes combine with Wharton's vivid descriptions of places and people to give a liveliness to her depiction of this pre-Civil War era.

Lewis's ineffectual mother has inherited most of the family's resources, but she has turned them over to her husband, typical behavior of women of the era, and his sisters with their concern for their own reputations in the face of Lewis's ostracism show the degree to which social acceptance may be more important than family love. Only Lewis's wife Treeshy, who is both a social outcast and a homely, unfashionable woman, illustrates love and family values.

Though this is not as long as other Wharton novels, Wharton tells a compelling story, keeping her focus on Lewis and his family, rather than on the broader swath of society. In this sense this novel is more intimate and personal than some of Wharton's other novels. On the other hand, its narrower focus, however representative of the times, leads to a less expansive interpretation of familiar themes. As Wharton brings the resolution of the novella up to date by tracing the paintings to the present, the struggles of Lewis and Treeshy for social and intellectual independence achieve even greater poignancy. n Mary Whipple

Set in the aftermath of World War I, this study of 1920s society, with its elements of social comedy and satire, follows Nick Lansing and his wife Susy, through the highest levels of European society. Though they have the credentials to be accepted, they are financially limited, always unsure where their next funds will come from. Nick and Susy have married for love, with the understanding that if either of them finds a more financially stable suitor with a long-term future, that each is free to dissolve the marriage. They spend their honeymoon year living in the empty European homes of their more affluent friends.

When they stay in the palazzo of Ellie Vanderlyn in Venice, early in the novel, Susy receives a note from Ellie asking her to mail four letters, one each week, to Ellie's absent husband Nelson, so that he will not know she is away. Confronted with this thorny problem, which she has been sworn not to reveal to Nick, Ellie agrees, knowing no way around the problem, since she and Nick depend on Ellie's hospitality.

It reveals no plot surprises to say that Susy's deception eventually undermines her superficial but loving relationship with Nick. Wounded by Susy's lack of trust and her deceit, Nick needs to get away. The separate comings-of-age of Nick and Susy occupy the bulk of the novel as each, still sharing the extravagant lifestyles of their friends, considers whether to honor the agreement to let the other person go if someone "better" comes along.

Wharton presents their dilemmas clearly--their desire to experience the "good life," their belief that they deserve to do so, the lengths they are willing to go to make it possible, the conflicts they face between their latent ethical sense and the realities of their lives, the belated discovery that each has the potential to support himself/herself, and the growing awareness that life offers many rewards that are not financial.

Filled with trenchant observations about society and the frivolous behavior of those committed to remaining part of it, Wharton's novel draws attention to the conflict between real feelings and pretensions and between real goals and social expectations, presaging the novels of Fitzgerald. A sophisticated and elegantly written study of aristocratic society in the twenties in Europe, this is not Wharton's most thoughtful novel, but it one of her best observed. Mary Whipple

The House of Mirth (Barnes & Noble Classics)
False Dawn
The Buccaneers (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)

I found this book to be unlike the other works I had read by Edith Wharton. While her books "The Age of Innocence," "The House of Mirth" and "The Children" focused on the intricacies of upper-class society, "Hudson River Bracketed" is more about the creative personality. Young Vance Weston comes to New York State from a small town in the midwest. Untutored, he has a strong desire to write, and he makes his way in the New York literary world. He forms a strong friendship with a wealthy and brilliant women, Halo Tarrant. This book occasionally felt a bit like a pot-boiler, but it did hold my attention, particularly due to the way that Vance was in many ways a difficult person, yet undeniably a talented writer. There is a sequel (which I have not read) called "The Gods Arrive"

In a way, Edith Wharton was at her best in her novellas -- her stories are lean, taut and emotionally deep.

And the rather elusive "Madame De Treymes and Three Novellas" brings together four of her not-so-well-known novellas, elongated short stories that explore love, morality, betrayal, the conventions on both sides of the Atlantic, and povert. They're not just fascinating, but beautifully written.

"The Touchstone" was Wharton's first novella that made it to print. Stephen Glennard needs money to marry his fiancee, but his job is in tatters. So he decides to sell the love letters left to him by his ex-girlfriend, a famous and newly deceased author -- to live happily ever after with one lover, Glennard will betray another.

"Madame De Treymes" is a sort of Henry Jamesian novella, taking place in early twentieth-century Paris. It follows the unhappy lives abroad of two Americans -- the miserable Fanny Frisbee is married to a nasty aristocrat, and living in Paris. As a knight on a white horse, her friend John is trying to convince her to divorce her hubby and marry him. Of course, it can't be THAT simple.

"The Bunner Sisters" is one of Wharton's darkest stories, in which two timid sisters run a small, failing shop together. When Ann Eliza gives Evalina a gifts, they both become involved with the mysterious man, Ramy, who sold it to her. Ann Eliza attempts to sacrifice money and happiness for her sister's happiness, but neither knows what Ramy is hiding from them, or how it will destroy their lives.

And in "Sanctuary," Kate Orme is horrified when she discovers a blinkered moral failing in her fiancee, which led to a woman's death. Determined to save his kids from a similar flaw, she marries him and is pretty quickly widowed. But years later, her brilliant, charming young son is given a tempting offer that may lead him to cheat his way through a contest.

Edith Wharton was all about unvarnished looks at society, whether it was the society of New York slums, the Manhattan wealthy, or a French aristocratic family. And while these novellas aren't her best, or most insightful, they pack a certain dramatic punch, no matter what happens to her characters.

She usually had a formal, often poetic writing style, rich with light, smells, sounds and the swirl of nature. Two of these stories qualify, but two are less so -- "Bunner Sisters" is painfully grimy and bleak, and "Sanctuary" has the feeling of a full-length novel that Wharton never got around to fully fleshing out.

But whatever the prose was like, it was overshadowed by the bones of her stories -- if she took a hard look at hypocrises and social conventions, she didn't flinch from showing what happened to those that transgressed. Some become wealthy, some fade into homeless poverty. It's realistic, but a bit depressing.

The main characters are not quite as realistic in some of these as in some of her works -- Kate Orme is a big bundle of whiny manic angst, and Evalina is just too limp. But most of them do come to life brilliantly -- the noble John, divided Glennard, poverty-stricken Ann Eliza, and likable Dick. A lot of them were unlike Wharton, which makes their lifelike qualities even more striking.

"Madame De Treymes and Three Novellas" is not quite Edith Wharton's best work, but this quartet of clever, lesser-known works is one that deserves a look.

I read this book at a time when a friendship I'd held near and dear ended irrationally and insensitively, my kids were growing into independent teens, but also a time when my 18-year marriage was coming into a state of profound comfort and happiness. However, I was also in the midst of finishing a college degree, working on writings I hoped to have published, and coping with the diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis. This book brought me down to earth, in a way, because I think we tend to look upon writers as a special breed of people with no personal difficulties, when quite the opposite is actually true. If nothing else, this book taught me that it could very well be my current travails that put me into print!

There is a deep sense of irony in a lot of Edith Wharton's work. It seems puzzling given her time and gender-this is not a voice typical of nineteenth century women. Along comes Gloria Erlich, an independent scholar with an
account of Wharton's childhood with an aloof mother followed by a celibate marriage (?! as they might say in chess-talk).
All of a sudden, Wharton's voice becomes easier to understand and her female characters a lot more accessible. Score one for independent scholars.


--Lynn Hoffman, author of THE NEW SHORT COURSE IN WINE and
the sexually well-educated bang BANG: A Novel