Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture

Edith Wharton and the Politics of Race

jennie a. kassanoff

Edith Wharton feared that the 'ill-bred', foreign and poor would overwhelm a native American elite. Drawing on a range of turn-of-the-century social documents, unpublished archival material and all of Wharton's novels, Jennie A. Kassanoff argues that a more accurate picture of her appreciation of American culture and democracy develops through less engagement with these controversial views. She pursues her theme by documenting Wharton's spirited participation in turn-of-the-century discourses ranging from euthanasia and tourism to pragmatism and Native Americans.

Genres historynonfiction

240 pages, Hardcover

First published October 11,2004

Series

Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture