Name: The Custom of the Country
SKU: 2085835
Price: 32.31 EUR
Availability: InStock
Author: Wharton, Edith ; Emsley, Sarah
ISBN: 9781551116730

Type

Physical Book

Author

Edith Wharton

Illustrated by

Sarah Emsley

Publisher

Broadview Press Inc

Language

English

Pages

486

Format

Paperback

Dimensions

21.4x13.8x2.6 cm

Weight

0.52 kg.

ISBN

1551116731

ISBN13

9781551116730

Synopsis "The Custom of the Country"

Edith Wharton's satiric anatomy of American society in the first decade of the twentieth century appeared in 1913; it both appalled and fascinated its first reviewers, and established her as a major novelist. The Saturday Review wrote that she had "assembled as many detestable people as it is possible to pack between the covers of a six-hundred page novel," but concluded that the book was "brilliantly written," and "should be read as a parable." It follows the career of Undine Spragg, recently arrived in New York from the Midwest and determined to conquer high society. Glamorous, selfish, mercenary and manipulative, her principal assets are her striking beauty, her tenacity, and her father's money. With her sights set on an advantageous marriage, Undine pursues her schemes in a world of shifting values, where triumph is swiftly followed by disillusion. Wharton was recreating an environment she knew intimately, and Undine's education for social success is chronicled in meticulous detail. The novel superbly captures the world of post-Civil War America, as ruthless in its social ambitions as in its business and politics.

Edith Wharton

(Author)

View Author's Page

Edith Wharton was born in New York in 1862. Her maiden name was Edith Newbold Jones. Her family was upper class, comparable to European aristocracy, and consequently she received a meticulous private education. In 1907, she settled in France, where she became a disciple and friend of Henry James. Her most famous work is The Age of Innocence, published in 1920 and winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1921. She is considered the most brilliant American novelist of her generation, admired by intellectuals of the stature of Henry James, Francis Scott Fitzgerald, Jean Cocteau, and Ernest Hemingway.

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