Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Volume One

The ghost stories Wharton never wrote for polite society. These five early tales reveal a young author already obsessed with what lingers: the crimes we commit, the desires we cannot release, the past that refuses to stay buried. In "Kerfol," a haunted estate bears witness to a murder committed in another century. "Mrs. Manstey's View" traps a woman in a single window's vision of impending loss. "The House of the Dead Hand" delivers Gothic menace with a sealed message from beyond the grave. Even "The Dilettante," with its study of a charming wastrel, carries the weight of inherited consequence. These are ghost stories in the truest sense: not mere supernatural fare, but narratives haunted by the inescapable past. For readers who know Wharton's later society novels, these tales offer something rawer, darker, and far more unsettling.