Edith Wharton Collected editions

Edith Wharton (1862 – 1937) was an American novelist, short story writer, and designer whose novel The Age of Innocence won the 1921 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, making her the first woman to receive the award. Her works explore love, marriage, and the social constraints of the Gilded Age with elegance and unsparing insight.

Born into a wealthy New York family, Wharton was intimately familiar with the world of privilege she often critiqued. Her fiction blends rich detail with a keen awareness of the ways class and convention shape human relationships.

In addition to The Age of Innocence, Edith Wharton authored Ethan Frome, The House of Mirth, and numerous short stories, securing her legacy as one of America’s foremost literary voices.