"No one fully knows our
Edith who hasn't seen her in the act of creating a habitation
for herself," remarked Henry James, Wharton's close
friend.
The Mount is an autobiographical house. Every aspect of
the estate –including its gardens, architecture, and
interior design – evokes the spirit of its creator.
Within the year Wharton reported: "Lenox
has had its usual tonic effect on me, & I feel like
a new edition, revised & corrected....in the very best
type. It is great fun out at the place, now too –
everything is pushing up new shoots – not only cabbages
& strawberries, but electric lights & plumbing.
I really think we shall be installed – after a fashion
– by Sept. 1st."
She bought the 113-acre Lenox property in 1902 and began
to create an environment that would meet her needs as designer,
gardener, hostess, and above all, writer.
Construction proceeded quickly.
Within the year Wharton reported: "Lenox has had its
usual tonic effect on me, & I feel like a new edition,
revised & corrected . . . in the very best type. It
is great fun out at the place, now too - as everything is
pushing up new shoots - not only cabbages & strawberries,
but electric lights & plumbing. I really think we shall
be installed - after a fashion - by Sept. 1st."
As moving day neared, Wharton, who was struggling
with the financial demands of construction, thanked her
publisher at Scribner's for a timely royalty payment:
"Many thanks for the cheque for $2,191.81, which
even to the 81 cents, is welcome to an author in the last
throes of house-building." In a letter to a friend
a few weeks later, she exclaimed: "Finalmente!
We have been in the new house for ten days, & have enjoyed
every minute of it."
In a letter to her lover Morton Fullerton,
Wharton revealed how much of herself she put into The Mount:
"I am amazed at the success of my efforts. Decidedly,
I'm a better landscape gardener than novelist, and this
place, every line of which is my own work, far surpasses
The House of Mirth. . . "
And, from Wharton's autobiography, A Backward
Glance (1934):
"On a slope overlooking the dark waters and densely
wooded shores of Laurel Lake we built a spacious and dignified
house, to which we gave the name of my great-grandfather's
place, The Mount…There for over ten years I lived
and gardened and wrote contentedly, and should doubtless
have ended my days there had not a grave change in my husband's
health made the burden of the property too heavy.
"But meanwhile The Mount was to give me country cares
and joys, long happy rides and drives through the wooded
lanes of that loveliest region, the companionship of a few
dear friends, and the freedom from trivial obligations which
was necessary if I was to go on with my writing. The Mount
was my first real home…its blessed influence still
lives in me."
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Edith Wharton motoring with Henry
James and Teddy Wharton
at The Mount, 1904. Wharton mss, Lilly Library, Indiana
University.
Edith Wharton at The Mount, 1905.
Edith Wharton Restoration.
Edith Wharton, 1905. Wharton mss,
Lilly Library, Indiana University.
Edith Wharton in procession at Yale
University, after receiving an Honorary Doctorate of Letters
(June 20, 1923). Edith Wharton Restoration.
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