Bøker av Edith Wharton

Since its publication in 1905 The House of Mirth has commanded attention for the sharpness of Wharton's observations and the power of her style. Its heroine, Lily Bart, is beautiful, poor, and unmarried at 29. In her search for a husband with money and position she betrays her own heart and sows the seeds of the tragedy that finally overwhelms her. The House of Mirth is a lucid, disturbing analysis of the stifling limitations imposed upon women of Wharton's generation. Herself born into Old New York Society, Wharton watched as an entirely new set of people living by new codes of conduct entered the metropolitan scene. In telling the story of Lily Bart, who must marry to survive, Wharton recasts the age-old themes of family, marriage, and money in ways that transform the traditional novel of manners into an arresting moderndocument of cultural anthropology.

Set against the bleak winter landscape of New England, Ethan Frome tells the story of a poor farmer, lonely and downtrodden, his wife Zenia, and her cousin, the enchanting Mattie Silver. In her introduction the distinguished critic Elaine Showalter discusses the background to the novel's composition and the reasons for its enduring success.

Word count 24,820 CD: American English

Compelling, rich and strange, the ghost stories of Edith Wharton, like vintage wine, have matured and grown more potent with the passing years.

Edith Wharton's satiric anatomy of American society in the first decade of the twentieth century both appalled and fascinated its first reviewers. It follows the career of Undine Spragg, as she pursues her schemes and social ambitions in a world of shifting values, where triumph is swiftly followed by disillusion.

'We can't behave like people in novels, though, can we?'Newland Archer and May Welland are the perfect couple. He is a wealthy young lawyer and she is a lovely and sweet-natured girl. All seems set for success until the arrival of May's unconventional cousin Ellen Olenska, who returns from Europe without her husband and proceeds to shake up polite New York society. To Newland, she is a breath of fresh air and a free spirit, but the bond that develops between them throws his values into confusion and threatens his relationship with May.VINTAGE DECO: Nine blazing, daring novels to celebrate the 1920s - 100 years on.

Word count 10,700 CD: American English

Edith Wharton's most famous novel, written immediately after the end of the First World War, is a brilliantly realized anatomy of New York society in the 1870s. The charming Newland Archer is content to live within its constraints until he meets Ellen Olenska, whose arrival threatens his impending marriage as well as his comfortable future.

Novel by Pulitzer prize winning author of THE AGE OF INNOCENCE

Rich and strange, these stories reveal a seductive and little-known aspect of this superb writer.

*With an afterword by Marilyn French*Companion volume to HUDSON RIVER BRACKETED

A powerful study of class, of morality and of love.

* A bestseller when it was first published in 1928, THE CHILDREN is a touching, bittersweet novel about a middle-aged man's relationship with a band of unruly children - and of his conflicting feelings for the eldest, a girl on the cusp of womanhood.

The return of the beautiful Countess Olenska into the rigidly conventional society of New York sends reverberations throughout the upper reaches of society. Newland Archer, an eligible young man of the establishment is about to announce his engagement to May Welland, a pretty ing nue, when May's cousin, Countess Olenska, is introduced into their circle. The Countess brings with her an aura of European sophistication and a hint of scandal, having left her husband and claimed her independence. Her sorrowful eyes, her tragic worldliness and her air of unapproachability attract the sensitive Newland and, almost against their will, a passionate bond develops between them. But Archer's life has no place for passion and, with society on the side of May and all she stands for, he finds himself drawn into a bitter conflict between love and duty.

Edith Wharton's novel reworks the eternal triangle of two women and a man in a strikingly original manner. The consequent drama, set in New York during the 1870s, reveals terrifying chasms under the polished surface of upper-class society as the increasingly fraught Archer struggles with conflicting obligations and desires.

The text of Wharton's richly allusive Pulitzer Prize-winning 1921 novel of desire and its implications in Old New York has been rigorously annotated by a prominent Wharton scholar.

Exploring the country and its people during the final days of World War I, Wharton's classic account of her journey through Morocco describes the places she visited - such as mosques, palaces, ruins, markets and harems - with typical observation, colour and spirit.

* A Virago Modern Classic * These stories - all powerful moral analyses - demonstrate the true professionalism of Edith Wharton.

Edith Wharton's subtle variation on the theme of the eternal triangle features Anna Leath, a rich American widow living in France; and the first love of Anna's youth, George Darrow, who has come back into her life. Hoping to be reunited with George, Anna finds the path of love does not run smooth.

A novel first published in 1913. George Darrow, a young diplomat en route from London to France, is engaged to be married to a respectable widow, but when she asks for time to prepare her children for the marriage he is unsettled, and embarks on an affair that will affect all their lives. From the author of THE AGE OF INNOCENCE.

On a poor farm near Starkfield in western Massachusetts, Ethan Frome struggles to wrest a living from the land, unassisted by his whining and hypochondriacal wife Zeena. When Zeena's young cousin Mattie Silver is left destitute, the only place she can go is Ethan's farm.