The Custom of the Country

Edith Wharton's lacerating satire on marriage and materialism in turn-of-the-century New York features her most selfish, ruthless, and irresistibly outrageous female character.
Undine Spragg is an exquisitely beautiful but ferociously acquisitive young woman from the Midwest who comes to New York to seek her fortune. She achieves her social ambitions-but only at the highest cost to her family, her admirers, and her several husbands. Wharton lavished on Undine an imaginative energy that suggests she was as fascinated as she was appalled by the alluring monster she had created. It is the complexity of her attitude that makes The Custom of the Country-with its rich social and emotional detail and its headlong narrative power-one of the most fully realized and resonant of her works.

Edith Wharton (1862-1937) was an American novelist, short story writer, and designer, best known for her novels The Age of Innocence, The House of Mirth, and Ethan Frome. Wharton grew up traveling with her parents around Europe and was born into a rich household in New York City. Wharton was a gifted designer in addition to being a writer, and during her life she contributed to the interior design of several residences. Throughout World War I, she also served as a war journalist and was honored with the French Legion of Honor for her humanitarian efforts. In 1921, Wharton became the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for literature for her book The Age of Innocence. She kept writing up until her death in 1937, and she is regarded as one of the best American authors of the 20th century.