The House of Mirth demonstrates Wharton's unmatched storytelling abilities and her astute perceptions of the savagery hidden beneath the well-bred veneer of high society. Before being published as a book on October 14, 1905, The House of Mirth was serialized in the Scribner's Magazine in January, 1905. The book was a huge success and gained both commercial and critical acclaim. It is one of the most well-known works of Edith Wharton and is still praised for painting a gut-wrenchingly accurate portrait of Ney York's aristocracy in the 20th century. The story can be perceived as a satire of manners about vast wealth and a woman who can only define herself through the eyes of other people. A tragedy of sorts is depicted in the story of Lily Bart's transformation from a former ingénue who was still attractive at the age of twenty-nine to a destitute and disheveled woman in her early thirties. However, Lily's tragedy is less the result of her own hubris than it is the result of the society's unwavering attitudes toward her beauty and spirit, which prevents the novel from being classified as a tragedy in the traditional sense.
Edith Wharton was born Edith Newbold Jones on January 24, 1862, at 14 West 23rd St. into a prosperous New York family. The only daughter and third child of George Frederic and Lucretia Rhinelander Jones, Edith spent a large portion of her early years in Europe, primarily in France, Germany, and Italy, where she honed her language skills and deepened her appreciation for the beauty of literature, art, and architecture. Although Wharton had a collection of her own poems privately printed when she was 16, she did not start writing seriously until after several years of marriage. The Valley of Decision, Wharton's debut book, was released in 1902. A novel of manners published in 1905, The House of Mirth, examined the stratified society in which the author was raised and its response to societal upheaval. She received a lot of positive reviews and attention for the book. She also became the first woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. At age 75, she died at Pavillon Colombe on August 11, 1937. In Versailles' Cimetière des Gonards, she is buried next to her close friend Walter Berry.
