Edith Wharton and Genre

Based on extensive new archival research, Edith Wharton and Genre: BeyondFiction offers the first study of Wharton’s full engagement with original writing ingenres outside those with which she has been most closely identified. So muchmore than an acclaimed novelist and short story writer, Wharton is reconsideredin this book as a controversial playwright, a gifted poet, a trailblazing travelwriter, an innovative and subversive critic, a hugely influential design writer, andan author who overturned the conventions of autobiographical form. Herversatility across genres did not represent brief sidesteps, temporary diversionsfrom what has long been read as her primary role as novelist. Each was pursuedfully and whole-heartedly, speaking to Wharton’s very sense of herself as anartist and her connected vision of artistry and art. The stories of these other EdithWhartons, born through her extraordinary dexterity across a wide range ofgenres, and their impact on our understanding of her career, are the focus of thisnew study, revealing a bolder, more diverse, subversive and radical writer thanhas long been supposed.

“Laura Rattray expands our visions of Edith Wharton and, in doing so, makes Wharton’s life and authorship far more representative of women’s experience than previously understood. Edith Wharton and Genre is indispensable reading not only for Wharton scholars but also all those interested in women’s writing across genre.” (Myrto Drizou, Women's Studies, February 1, 2021)

Laura Rattray is Reader in American Literature at the University of Glasgow,Scotland, and Director of its Centre for American Studies. Her work on Whartonincludes, as editor, Edith Wharton in Context (2012), The Unpublished Writings ofEdith Wharton (2009), Edith Wharton’s The Custom of the Country (2010), Summer(2015) and, with Jennifer Haytock, The New Edith Wharton Studies (2019).