Edith Wharton's Writings from the Great War

An examination of Edith Whartons works from World War I, reclaiming Wharton as a Great War writerEdith Wharton resided in France during World War I, visiting combat zones and hospitals and working tirelessly with refugee and childrens relief organizations. In magazines and newspapers such as the New York Times, Saturday Evening Post, and Scribners, she wrote prodigiously about the wardispatches, feature articles, and poems. During this time she also completed a number of short stories, two books (Summer and The Marne), and the essays that were collected in French Ways and Their Meaning. The war remained a topic for her after its conclusion, most notably in her 1923 novel, A Son at the Front. Yet none of this work has received the critical attention it deserves. Julie Olin-Ammentorp, through her detailed examination of a wide range of texts, including archival sources and materials long out of print, reclaims Whartons war writings and places her in the company of other Great War writers.Olin-Ammentorp integrates all of Whartons war-time literary genres, discusses common themes, and examines issues such as Whartons exclusion from the canon of Great War writers; the effect of the war on her choice of subject, style, and tone; her shifting perspective on the war itself, as it dragged on far longer than anyone anticipated; her sense of personal, social, and literary destabilization during the war; and her increased sense of the role of history during and after the war.Olin-Ammentorp quotes many evocative passages from Whartons wartime correspondencemost notably to Henry James, who avidly read Whartons letters as if they were dispatches from the front. Particularly new is the inclusion of Whartons poetry composed during the war years, most of which has remained unpublished until now. In addition, Olin-Ammentorps examination of A Son at the Front is more detailed, comprehensive, and complex than any study to date. She concludes with a reflection on Whartons last depiction of the war years in her memoir, A Backward Glance.In addition to providing a thorough analysis of Whartons war writings, the book includes two appendixes of her out-of-print and scattered writings, available for the first time in over 85 years. The first contains the war poetry; the second includes a sampling of Whartons war-related nonfiction prose, including newspaper reportage, magazine articles, an obituary for her young friend Ronald Simmons who died in the war, and a speech she gave to American servicemen.