Edith Wharton - The House of Mirth/The Custom of the Country/The Age of Innocence - Couverture souple

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1840460237 ISBN 13 : 9781840460230

Editeur : Palgrave, 1998

Synopsis

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A propos du livre

Présentation de l'éditeur :

The widespread resurgence of interest in Edith Wharton's career over the past twenty years has restored to print most of her fiction, travel books, and writings on architecture, gardening, and interior decoration. Yet one significant and substantial portion of her accomplishment has remained largely overlooked: Wharton's numerous exercises in literary criticism. Constituting an unusually little-known body of work by an otherwise preeminent American writer, Wharton's many scattered reviews and essays, literary eulogies, and forewords and introductions (to her own work, and to works of others) have never before been collected in a single volume. Covering works of various literary traditions, including eloquent general considerations of fiction and criticism, and embracing novels, volumes of lyric and dramatic verse, and works by other critics of literature, art, and architecture, these critical writings uniquely demonstrate the extraordinary range of Wharton's critical interests and intelligence. A searching and comprehensive introductory essay places her critical prose in the context of Wharton's career as a whole, and draws on a wealth of unpublished materials in exploring the uncertainties and inhibitions against which she had to struggle in order to express herself as a critic at all. Assembling her miscellaneous critical writings (including some newly discovered texts), this authoritative edition makes an exceptional contribution not only to the ongoing "Wharton revival" but to the study of American literature, of literary criticism, and of women as writers of criticism.

Présentation de l'éditeur :

Originally published by Scribners in 1917, Summer is a novel of Wharton's mid-period and tells the story of Charity, a girl 'of the mountains' who is the ward of Lawyer Royall. The plot recounts how Charity finds herself caught between the attentions of two essentially unsavoury characters, Royall on the one side, who does himself no favours by invading the girl's bedroom, and on the other Lucius Harney, who purports to be the gentleman suitor only to get Charity pregnant while actually engaged to another woman. That Harney also cavorts with prostitutes only serves to emphasise his true character. Taken by itself, the plot shows similarities to the work of Thomas Hardy in its emphasis on a strong female lead who is placed in jeopardy by the men she attracts. Consciously or not, Wharton also seeks to make connections with the landscape, creating an affinity between Charity and her Mountain roots. Whether this succeeds or not is another matter.

À propos de cette édition

• Éditeur: Palgrave
• Date d'édition: 1998
• ISBN 10: 1840460237
• ISBN 13: 9781840460230
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 160