Edith Wharton

This book uses traditional methods to show that Edith Wharton's learning in literature and the fine arts was unusually masterful, that she applied her knowledge to create new models of literary allusion, and that in her work she planted clues to personal secrets.

The effects of this study is to require reassessment not only of the critical possibilities of Edith Wharton's work and the private life about which she was so reticent but also of her position in American literature. The book concludes with the assertion that, as a bridge between the Victorian and modern periods, Edith Wharton should stand independently as an American writer of the first rank.