Edith Wharton didn’t like parties, at least not those big formal affairs with hundreds of people milling around the house and grounds enjoying tea, crumpets and their place in polite society.
But, after visiting The Mount, Wharton’s home for nine years from 1902 to 1911 and the place where she wrote “Ethan Frome” and “The House of Mirth,” it seems almost a shame she wasn’t more predisposed to entertain. The three-story home, designed by Wharton herself in the fashion of a 17th century Palladian-style English Country home, would have been a great place to host parties during the last days of the Gilded Age, but Wharton wasn’t so inclined. She was much more concerned about writing.