Today Edith Wharton’s fundamental interest in portraying women’s lives is well-recognised among critical and popular audiences. The introductory chapter to The Secrets and Silences of Edith Wharton’s Women explains why further scholarly engagement with this concern in her body of work is important. It argues that an examination of her frequent use of secrets and silences offers an analytical framework with considerable potential for increasing understanding of Wharton’s depictions of fictional women in the early twentieth century, and of her work as a professional woman writer. It draws attention to key commentators and works that have influenced approaches taken in this book and then turns briefly to Wharton’s biography to suggest a connection between her personal reticence and manifestations of withholding in her writing. It concludes with an outline of the six remaining chapters in this book and an introduction to the texts by Wharton that they examine.