The Letters of Edith Wharton (Magill’s Literary Annual 1991-2005)
At a glance:
- Author: Edith Wharton
- First Published: 1988
- Type of Work: Letters
- Time of Work: 1874-1937
- Setting: The United States, England, the Continent, and Africa
- Genres: Nonfiction, Autobiography, Letters
- Subjects: Journalism or journalists, Traveling or travelers, Love or romance, Authors or writers, Literature, Friendship, Novelists, Death or dying, Creative process, World War I
- Locales: Africa, France, United States, England, Italy
In spite of the unfair yet abiding assessment of Edith Wharton as a second-rate Henry James, she occupies a unique position in the history of American literature. She is what James himself might have called “the real thing,” a bluestocking artist whose novel The House of Mirth (1905) alone would place her in the first ranks of the best American writers.
Wharton was an indefatigable correspondent, writing as many as six letters a day for long periods of her life. It is no surprise to find that more than four thousand of her letters are extant and available for study. R....
[The entire page is 2447 words long]
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