A black comedy of manners about vast wealth and a woman who can define herself only through the perceptions of others. The beautiful Lily Bart lives among the nouveaux riches of New York City – people whose millions were made in railroads, shipping, land speculation and banking. In this morally and aesthetically bankrupt world, Lily, age twenty-nine, seeks a husband who can satisfy her cravings for endless admiration and all the trappings of wealth. But her quest comes to a scandalous end when she is accused of being the mistress of a wealthy man. Exiled from her familiar world of artificial conventions, Lily finds life impossible. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Wharton’s sly and delicious novel about the ambitious social ascent of Undine Spragg, now in a Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition, with a foreword by Sofia Coppola A Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition Considered by many to be her masterpiece, Edith Wharton’s second full-length work is a scathing yet personal examination of the exploits and follies of the modern upper class. As she unfolds the story of Undine Spragg, from New York to Europe, Wharton affords us a detailed glimpse of what might be called the interior décor of this America and its nouveau riche fringes. Through a heroine who is as vain, spoiled, and selfish as she is irresistibly fascinating, and through a most intricate and satisfying plot that follows Undine’s marriages and affairs, she conveys a vision of social behavior that is both supremely informed and supremely disenchanted.

The Age of Innocence , written by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Edith Wharton , is a classic love story set in late 19th century New York City. It tells the story of Newland Archer, a young lawyer, and his struggle between his arranged marriage to a beautiful but conventional woman and his passionate love for her cousin, the scandalous Countess Ellen Olenska. This novel explores the complexities of life in a society bound by rigid rules and expectations. Through the eyes of Newland Archer, readers gain insight into the hypocrisy, snobbery, and pretense of the Gilded Age. The Age of Innocence is a timeless classic that provides an honest, humorous, and often painful look at the human condition. Edith Wharton (1862-1937) was an American novelist, short story writer, and designer. She was the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize in Literature in 1921 for her novel, The Age of Innocence . Wharton’s works are known for their meticulous attention to detail and her penetrating insight into the lives of the American upper class. Born into a prominent New York family, Wharton was educated at home and in Europe. She began writing in her teens and mostly kept her work to herself until she published her first collection of stories, The Greater Inclination , in 1899. Her first novel, The House of Mirth , was published in 1905 and met with huge success in both the US and abroad. Wharton went on to write over 40 novels and short stories, including Ethan Frome (1911), The Custom of the Country (1913), and Summer (1917). Wharton was a tireless advocate for social reform. She wrote extensively about the plight of women and the working class in America and founded the first school for underprivileged children in New York. Wharton was also a passionate traveler and designer. She wrote travel books about her travels throughout Europe and the Middle East, and was known for her elegant and luxurious interiors. Wharton’s works remain popular to this day and she is widely considered to be one of the greatest American writers of her time. Her works are still widely read, discussed, and studied in academic circles.

“I want to put my hand out and touch you. I want to do for you and care for you. I want to be there when you're sick and when you're lonesome.” ― Edith Wharton, Ethan Frome The classic novel of despair, forbidden emotions, and sexual undercurrents set against the austere New England countryside. Ethan Frome works his unproductive farm and struggles to maintain a bearable existence with his difficult, suspicious and hypochondriac wife, Zeena. But when Zeena's vivacious cousin enters their household as a hired girl, Ethan finds himself obsessed with her and with the possibilities for happiness she comes to represent. In one of American fiction's finest and most intense narratives, Edith Wharton moves this ill-starred trio toward their tragic destinies. Different in both tone and theme from Wharton's other works, Ethan Frome has become perhaps her most enduring and most widely read book. A True Classic that Belongs on Every Bookshelf!