The story of young Lily Bart and her tragic sojourn among the upper class of turn-of-the-century New York, it touches on the insidious effects of social convention and upon the sexual and financial aggression to which women of independent spirit were exposed. The House of Mirth (1905), Wharton’s tenth book and her first novel of contemporary life, was an immediate runaway bestseller, with 140,000 copies in print within three months of publication. In all of them her strong and autobiographical impulse is disciplined by her writer’s craft and her unfailing regard for her audience. The four novels in this Library of America volume show Wharton at the height of her powers as a social observer and critic, examining American and European lives with a vision rich in detail, satire, and tragedy.
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