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    Ethan Frome Review

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    Joshua Justin Leu
    Edith Wharton's novel Ethan Frome is a critique of the harsh realities of rural life in New England and the soul-destroying effects it can have. It tells the story of Ethan Frome, a farmer dissatisfied with his life and marriage who finds a brief spark of happiness when his wife's cousin Mattie comes to stay with them. However, their growing feelings force them into a desperate act with tragic consequences, emphasizing how Ethan cannot escape his responsibilities. The novel also draws parallels to Wharton's own unhappy marriage and eventual escape from it, portraying Ethan's story as what could have been if she did not free herself.

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    Ethan Frome Review

    Uploaded by

    Joshua Justin Leu
    29 views3 pages
    Edith Wharton's novel Ethan Frome is a critique of the harsh realities of rural life in New England and the soul-destroying effects it can have. It tells the story of Ethan Frome, a farmer dissatisfied with his life and marriage who finds a brief spark of happiness when his wife's cousin Mattie comes to stay with them. However, their growing feelings force them into a desperate act with tragic consequences, emphasizing how Ethan cannot escape his responsibilities. The novel also draws parallels to Wharton's own unhappy marriage and eventual escape from it, portraying Ethan's story as what could have been if she did not free herself.

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    Edith Wharton's novel Ethan Frome is a critique of the harsh realities of rural life in New England and the soul-destroying effects it can have. It tells the story of Ethan Frome, a farmer dissatisfied with his life and marriage who finds a brief spark of happiness when his wife's cousin Mattie comes to stay with them. However, their growing feelings force them into a desperate act with tragic consequences, emphasizing how Ethan cannot escape his responsibilities. The novel also draws parallels to Wharton's own unhappy marriage and eventual escape from it, portraying Ethan's story as what could have been if she did not free herself.

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    29 views3 pages

    Ethan Frome Review

    Uploaded by

    Joshua Justin Leu
    Edith Wharton's novel Ethan Frome is a critique of the harsh realities of rural life in New England and the soul-destroying effects it can have. It tells the story of Ethan Frome, a farmer dissatisfied with his life and marriage who finds a brief spark of happiness when his wife's cousin Mattie comes to stay with them. However, their growing feelings force them into a desperate act with tragic consequences, emphasizing how Ethan cannot escape his responsibilities. The novel also draws parallels to Wharton's own unhappy marriage and eventual escape from it, portraying Ethan's story as what could have been if she did not free herself.

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
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    Review: Ethan Frome

    Edith Wharton’s novel Ethan Frome is a critique of the harsh realities of rural life

    and the soul leeching effect it can bring as well as a critique of the futility of running

    away from responsibility for love, addressing those who seek to “flee the responsiblilites

    of life”, told from the viewpoint of a man who picks up details of the events that took

    place in the novel many years after they have occured. the main character Ethan Frome

    is a relatively young man at large unsatisfied with his life in general. His wife, Zeena, is

    reduced to a crabby and bitter “old” woman, his farm life is not what he chose as his

    passion, and the very vitality that life used to hold for him is quickly being consumed by

    the long winters in his small town as well as the lack of the fulfillment of many of his

    dreams as a younger man such as attending college and becoming a scientist. That is,

    until his wife’s cousin, Mattie, is sent to stay with them because of the death of her

    father. This puts a spark of life in his dreary existence, which fuels his growing

    infatuation with Mattie as time progresses which is forced through a wringer as Zeena

    returns from a doctor’s visit with the news that Mattie must leave.

    The harshness and hope consuming effect of rural life is a major theme in the

    novel as the force of Winter can be seen in the harrowing effect it has on the inhabitants

    of Ethan’s little town, as well as the very existence of living as a rural farmer seems to

    have a parasitic effect on the spirit of the inhabitants of the town especially Ethan,

    paralleling the viewpoints of many historical scholars on the leech-like effect of rural life

    upon the mind. Ethan was tied down from becoming a scientist by the death of his

    father and the implied responsibility of having to care for the family farm. Time after

    time, this point is driven home as Ethan realizes that he cannot escape from his pitiful
    life as the negative consequences are too much for those around him to cope with. This

    in turn causes him and Mattie, upon discovering that she must leave, to attempt suicide

    by sledding into a large tree. However the attempt is unsuccessful leaving mattie too

    injured to go elsewhere but also causing a chink in her armor of vitality as she slowly

    succumbs to the same disease of loss of spirit as that of Ethan’s wife, leaving Ethan

    with two bitter women and no hope of escape from the harshness of reality. This

    emphasizes the theme that Ethan cannot hope to run away from the responsibilities of

    his farm and dependent wife. This results in the utter destruction of Ethan’s spirit as he

    is left as a shell of a man going about doing his duties until he becomes a tombstone on

    his family gravesite.

    In many ways the life of Edith Wharton parallels that of Ethan Frome. She had a

    loveless and bitter marriage with a man that was pushed upon her by social pressure.

    This marriage, much like Ethan’s, quickly grows sour but no hope of escape is readily

    seen for a long period of time and such the marriage and her life becomes very soul

    less and all consuming. Then finally, paralleling the potential escape seen by Ethan in

    Mattie, Wharton begins an affair with a journalist that lasts for many years before

    divorcing her previous husband. However many differences can be seen between

    Wharton’s life and that of Ethan as well. For instance she eventually escapes the bitter

    and almost insurmountable bonds of her loveless marriage while Ethan does not and in

    fact ends up in an even worse situation than previously. Thus it can be said that Ethan

    Frome is an extended metaphor of “what Wharton’s life could have ended like if she

    didn’t escape her Ethan Frome-istic life”.

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