Edith Wharton's Prisoners of Consciousness

The metaphor of life as prison obsessed Edith Wharton and consequently the theme of imprisonment appears in most of her 86 short stories. In the last several decades critical studies of Wharton''s fiction have focused on this theme of imprisonment but invariably it is related to biographical considerations. This study however is not concerned with such insights and influences; rather it concentrates on Wharton''s skill as a craftsman in consciously and carefully fitting her narrative techniques to the imprisonment theme. Representative tales from Wharton''s early period (1891-1904) her major phase (1905-1919) and her later years (1926-1937) have been examined and divided into four categories: individuals trapped by love and marriage men and women imprisoned by the dictates of society human beings victimized by the demands of art and morality and persons paralyzed by fear of the supernatural.