Wiltshire, England, UK (The Pretext)

Even though Guise Abbey is a fictional place, the place where it is located, Wiltshire, is real. It is one of the largest counties of England located in the southwest of the country.

Its area stretches over 3.500 km² and is divided into four districts. Wiltshire has an impressive landscape but the county is most famous for “Stonehenge”, a prehistoric monument which was used to watch different astrological events (Wiltshire, 2021).

In the short story the uncle of Guy Dawnish Lord Askern lives in Wiltshire at a place called Guise Abbey (Lewis, 1968, p. 637) where Guy himself spent his childhood. Additionally, Gwendolen Matcher lives near Guise Abbey (Lewis, 1968, p. 647) which is the reason for her and Guy’s long friendship.

Sources:

Lewis, R. W. B. (1968). The Collected Short Stories of Edith Wharton. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.

“Wiltshire”. England.de &Großbritannien, 2021, https://www.england.de/england/wiltshire. Accessed May 7, 2021.