Edith Wharton (1862–1937) was the youngest child of a New York family descended from “old money.” Her best-known novels include The House of Mirth (1905), Ethan Frome (1911), and The Custom of the Country (1913). In 1921, Wharton became the first woman to win a Pulitzer Prize, for her novel The Age of Innocence (1920). She lived her final years in Europe.