Osprey Notes

The Osprey Notes extends the map of Edith Wharton’s travel writing by rendering available short texts related to Wharton and travel from the Wharton Collection of the Beinecke Rare Book Collection at Yale University. It features the text of Edith Wharton’s previously unpublished Osprey notebook about her cruise to the Aegean in 1926, her early essay on seeing “Education of through the Eyes,” and her poem “Penelope” by courtesy of the Watkins and Loomis Agency. The archival material documents Wharton’s ongoing early interest in architecture, travel from the perspective of a woman, and writing about travel: at the intersection of these issues lies Wharton’s travel writing. The introductory essay locates Wharton’s 1888 journal and 1926 notebook about the Aegean, The Cruise of the Vanadis and the Osprey Notes, in the context of her theories about architecture in general and her other travel writing in particular. The texts provide new contexts for each other as well. This volume will be of interest to students, teachers and researchers alike.

Cover image: Benedictine Monastery, Monreale. © Matthias Süssen