The text of Wharton's richly allusive Pulitzer Prize-winning 1921 novel of Old New York is accompanied by necessarily rigorous annotation.

Contexts constructs the historical foundations of the novel, with documents on the "New York Four Hundred," elite social gatherings, and archery (the sport for daughters of the upper-crust), among others. Also featured in this section are contemporary reviews and some of Wharton's own letters and manuscript outlines.

Criticism features thirteen major essays on the novel, by Julia Ehrhardt, R. W. B. Lewis, Janet Goodwyn, Nancy Bentley, Brian Edwards, Anne Macmasters, Dale Bauer, Elizabeth Ammons, Judith Fryer, Cynthia Griffin Wolff, Linda Wagner Martin, Candace Waid, and Brigette Peucker (on film adaptations of the novel).

A Selected Bibliography is included.