Motor-Flight Through France

Preface

PREFACE I N May 1980, I set out, together with my friend and colleague Lynne Waldeland, on a five-week motorflight through France with Edith Wharton's Motor-Flight in hand. We traveled in a Renault rather than a Panhard; our "entourage" consisted of ourselves and a pair of suitcases; and we were spared the flat tires, the exposure to the elements, and the laryngitis that Wharton suffered before the invention of the windscreen. Our objective was to follow Wharton's route and to see France twice over, once through Wharton's eyes and once through our own. We read from Motor-Flight as we approached Beauvais and Vezelay, Chauvigny and Argeles and St. Bertrand-de-Comminges, Wharton's prose shaping our vision and expanding our imaginations . Before our mind's eye, Beauvais was transformed from an unfinished cathedral to "the Kubla Khan of architecture " and "a great hymn interrupted." The otherwise unremarkable noses of the Cardinals of Amboise in the cathedral at Rouen attained under the power of Wharton's prose the stature of "what a nose was meant [xi ] PREFACE to be-the prow of the face; the evidence ofits owner's standing, of his relation to the world, and his inheritance from the past." George Sand was inserted into her historical moment, into "the continual stream of greatness that Paris poured out upon Nohant," giving "the measure of what Nohant had to offer in return." MotorFlight offered to this traveler a France that only Edith Wharton could give as well as a deepened appreciation of her intelligence, insight, imagination, and craft. My experience was redoubled by the intelligence and enthusiasm of my traveling companion, Lynne Waldeland . Her insight into Wharton's life and work expanded and energized my own and confirmed my conviction that Motor-Flight should be reissued. I thank her for sharing with me her interest in the work of Edith Wharton and in Motor-Flight in particular. I wish to thank, as well, R. W. B. Lewis, James M. Mellard, Craig S. Abbott, and James I. Miller for their assistance. In 1973, Professor Lewis graciously introduced me to the Beineke Library and the Wharton papers at Yale. Since then he has been unfailingly generous in answering inquiries, in this case on the emendations in Motor-Flight, and in encouraging work on Wharton. James Mellard offered useful observations about my introduction, to its decided betterment. Craig [xii ] PREFACE Abbott advised me on editorial matters of importance to Wharton's text. James Miller, in his capacity as Chair of the Department of English, supported my work, making provision for the time necessary for me to complete this project in timely fashion. I am grateful to all of them. Finally, I thank my friend and spouse, Anthony E. Scaperlanda, for encouraging my work in both deed and spirit. My introduction is for him. M.S.S. [xiii ] ...