Edith Wharton

Newland Archer, son of a wealthy New York family, has become engaged to pretty, naive May. But as he tries to get their wedding date moved up, he becomes acquainted with May's exotic cousin, Countess Olenska, who has returned home after dumping her cheating husband. At first, the two are friends, but then they become something more.

From New York to Europe, the apartments of the nouveau riche to ancient French estates, Edith Wharton tells the story of Undine Spragg, a girl from a Midwestern town with unquenchable social aspirations. Though Undine is narcissistic, pampered, and incredibly selfish, she is a beguiling heroine whose marital initiation into New York high society from its trade-wealthy fringes is only the beginning of her relentless ambitions.

American author Edith Wharton is renowned for her merciless satires of marriage and money, set in the upper-class milieu into which she was born. Included here are a superb selection of her novels, short stories and plays, recorded for BBC Radio - as well as two programmes exploring her life and work. Includes: The House of Mirth, Madame de Treymes, The Reef, The Age of Innocence, The Custom of the Country, Ethan Frome and The Shadow of a Doubt.

Also includes Great Lives: Edith Wharton - Naomi Wolf joins presenter Matthew Paris to talk about Wharton and her work and In Our Time: Edith Wharton - Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Wharton's novels of America's Gilded Age.

Lewis Raycie is sent on a Grand Tour of Europe with instructions from his father to acquire a collection of Old Masters. When Lewis returns with a priceless collection of Renaissance masterpieces instead of the Raphael that his father wanted he is ridiculed by his family and disinherited by his father.

Lily Bart, 29, a beautiful impoverished New York girl, needs a rich husband to support her expensive habits and safeguard her place among the social elite. As a girl who has been on the marriage market for too long, she becomes vulnerable to gossip and slander.

Tina is a young woman caught between the mother who adopted her, Delia, and her true mother, plain, unmarried ‘aunt’ Charlotte. Tensions finally come to the surface on Tina’s wedding day.