Roman Fever

Wharton was born in 1862 in New York into an aristocratic family. She received a home education, using among other books the literature from her father's library. In the following years of her life, however, she struggled against this type of education and social constraint. Wharton spent her childhood and youth in Europe, where she became close to many famous writers. Henry James had a particular influence on her work. A portrait of Edith at the age of eight was created by the American artist Edward Harrison May, who lived in Paris.
In 1885, at the age of 23, Wharton married Edward Robbins Wharton, a banker from a noble Boston family. However, she was not happy. Wharton soon discovered that her husband was squandering money on mistresses. Their marriage broke apart, and in 1908 she fled to Paris, France, where she began an affair with Morton Fullerton, a journalist for The Times. For a long time Wharton and Fullerton's relationship was kept secret, known only to the writer's maid and Henry James.