Ethan Frome

piece of literature, Ethan Frome, which gives the book a frigid and depressing atmosphere. The cold nature of the book explains the protagonist’s, Ethan Frome’s, need to search for companionship in other people. The fear of existing alone and forgotten in the gelid winter appears to be too much to bear for Ethan Frome. He pounces on the first opportunity that arises and marries his mother’s caretaker, Zenobia. All appears to be well in Ethan’s eyes. However, unbeknownst to Ethan at the time,…

In the book Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton, a man named Ethan who lives on his family’s farm with no hope of leaving, struggles to support and to love his wife. When he begins to fall for his wife’s cousin who is helping out in the house during the midst of a cold depressing winter, she begins to turn it into a winter wonderland. Many aspects of the book lead up to the suicide attempt of Mattie and Ethan; it all starts with Mattie turning down Denis Eady and then Ethan kissing the cloth.…

Stuck on a farm, forced to deal with the eventual death of both his parents and lost in the beauty of the house maid Mattie Silver, Ethan Frome is a victim in Edith Wharton's novel Ethan Frome. Throughout the novel, Wharton highlights the circumstances Frome's faces that lead him to his incident on the sled when Mattie and he crash into a tree. Wharton begins Frome’s journey of poor circumstances when his father dies and he is left in Starkfield to tend for his sick mother while still…

In Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton, Ethan is shown to have many internal and external problems. This brings the question, “What is the primary cause for these problems?” into the readers mind. Many readers would say it is Zeena and her illness always bringing Ethan down. Some people say it is Maddie leading him on to get with her. The real source of all of Ethan’s problems is where he lives, Starkfield. Starkfield has basically ruined Ethan’s chance of true happiness from the beginning by holding…

Massachusetts, the characters in the novel Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton are profoundly impacted by the challenges and struggles that result from the austere surroundings. As a member of New York City’s elite upper class, Edith Wharton wrote numerous books with a setting in New York City and the upper class. However, Ethan Frome has a very different setting and the characters, therefore go through very different challenges and struggles. The plot of Ethan Frome often results from challenges…

The short story, Ethan Frome, by Edith Wharton transfered the idea that with all love, conflict emerges and can possibly destroy affection. The author compiled a journey through which the main character, Ethan Frome, discovered that social ideals and expectations can contradict with one’s yearnings. Ethan Frome went through an emotional voyage over rough seas from the beginning to the end. Frome, a married man in Starkfield, a town in Massachusetts, was anchored down by his wife’s disability.…

around him and the unwise decisions of Frome. Starkfield itself was a place where a dead community contrasted the vital climate (Wharton 7-8). Frome belonged to this dead community, and his emaciated look was obviously not the result of poverty or physical suffering alone—in fact, the unnamed narrator noticed that Frome’s refined interest in the sciences sharply contrasted his outer situation, proving that his misery came from a complex situation (Wharton 15). Ethan lived in a “complete absence…

In Chapters VI - VIII in the novella Ethan Frome, both Ethan and Zeena make references to things or ideas they value most. The author Edith Wharton, utilizes these characters’ attachments to convey information about both Zeena and Ethan, as well as the couple’s relationship. While Ethan values meaningful companionship and connecting with the outside world, Zeena values her pickle dish and her cat. Edith Wharton uses symbolism to explore the detrimental effects of physical and emotional…

In Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton the main character, Ethan, was married prematurely to a sickly Zeena. A woman "with no natural turn for housekeeping, and her training had done nothing to remedy the defect." (43 Wharton). In another book that I have recently enjoyed, The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway an old sick man goes out to fish for the 84th day with no luck in the many days prior. But in the 84th day he finds his mate, a strong Marlin. Ironically there is a greater love between the…

In Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton, symbolism plays a major role in the story. In order for the symbols in his story to “pop” out or show its “shine” Edith Wharton uses symbols that can be found in the story, and even uses the historical background that the symbol may have in society or in myths, for the symbols that appear in the story. In Edith Wharton story Ethan Frome, the symbols that are important in the story and in its plot are the color red, Zeena’s pet cat, Zeena’s best dish which got…