Edith Wharton: 1862-1937

Edith Wharton was born in New York City on January 24, 1862 into an aristocratic New York family with ancestry dating back 300 years. Her role as a daughter of society was to learn the mannerisms and rituals expected of well bred young women in those days. Later she would rebel against this role but as a child she was schooled at home and had the privilege of using her father's extensive library. She began, therefore, at an early age to read extensively.

In 1885, at twenty-three years of age, she married Edward Robbins Wharton, who was twelve years her senior. They divorced in 1913.

She then traveled extensively and finally settled in France where she helped untiringly with refugees in Paris during the First World War. She actually returned only once again in her lifetime to the United States to accept the Pulitzer prize for her novel, The Age of Innocence, the first woman ever to receive the prize.

In Paris she held salon where the gifted intellectuals of her time gathered to discuss and share ideas.

Wharton continued writing until her death in France on August 11, 1937.