Ethan Frome is a melancholy and thought-inspiring novel published in 1911 by Edith Wharton, an American author. It is a relatively famous American novel due to the themes it discusses, including small towns, the conflict between passion and reality, responsibility, and the nature of time.
Ethan Frome begins with an unnamed narrator, who remarks that he heard the story of Ethan Frome “bit by bit, from various people, and, as generally happens in such cases, each time it was a different story.” The unnamed narrator then establishes the setting for the audience - Starkfield, Massachusetts. The narrator immediately transitions to talk about Ethan Frome, who was very distinctive, as when the narrator met him, “he was the most striking figure in Starkfield, though he was but the ruin of a man”; he had “the careless powerful look” of a great man, despite the fact that he suffered from a significant limp. When it came to his face, “There was something bleak and unapproachable” in it, since it was “so stiffened and grizzled that I took him for an old man.” Surprisingly, Ethan was only 52, and the reason for his seemingly old age was told to the narrator by Harmon Gow, a native of Starkfield, who mentioned that Ethan “‘looked that way ever since he had his smash-up; and that’s twenty four years ago come next February.’” The narrator then notes the terrible effects the so-called “smash-up” had on Ethan, for Ethan suffered from a red gash across his forehead, and it had even malformed him, seeing that it “had so shortened and warped his right side that it cost him a visible effort to take the few stops from his buggy to the post-office window.” It was also noted that the few letters he received were addressed to his wife, Mrs. Zenobia (or as she is mostly called throughout the novel, Mrs. Zeena). Ethan, unsurprisingly, isn’t talkative at all, as everyone in Starkfield knew of his existence and greeted him courteously, though they would very rarely talk to him, and even then, the person who would talk to Ethan would usually be an old man around his age. Harmon then tells the narrator that the “smash-up” that Ethan suffered was so horrendous that it would have killed most people, but Ethan survived since “‘the Fromes are tough. Ethan’ll likely touch a hundred.’” Harmon then characterizes the small town he is in, Starkfield, as having a somewhat malicious nature, as he said that Ethan’s gaunt appearance could be due to his being in Starkfield for “‘too many winters,’” as “‘Most of the smart ones get away.’” Ethan, not being stupid, stayed in Starkfield not for himself, but for others - his father became sick while he went outside Starkfield to pursue higher education, which caused him to quit to care for him. Then his mother became sick, and he had to take care of her, and it was speculated that Zeena, not yet married to him, helped him take care of his mother, which was why he eventually married Zeena. After the deaths of his parents, Zeena herself fell victim to a variety of never-ceasing symptoms and complaints that have no definite origin, forcing Ethan to take care of her.
The narrator revealed why he was at Starkfield to begin with - “I had been sent up by my employers on a job connected with the big power-house at Corbury Junction.” The narrator then describes Starkfield by describing its weather and inhabitants in stark detail, for when he first arrived at Starkfield, he “had been struck by the contrast between the vitality of the climate and the deadness of the community.” During the month of December, snow was common, occurring on a daily schedule, and after the snow season was over, “a blazing blue sky poured down torrents of light and air on the white landscape.” The narrator then ironically commented that while such awesome weather patterns and the scenery should have livened the spirits of those in Starkfield, it only had the opposite effect of “retarding still more the sluggish pulse of Starkfield.” Eventually, the narrator stated that he knew why the people of Starkfield were the way they were - he had seen only good weather, and not how “this phase of crystal clearness [is] followed by long stretches of sunless cold; when the storms of February had pitched their white tents about the devoted village and the wild cavalry of March winds had charged down to their support.” The narrator then thinks about why Ethan didn't escape yet, as if he is really as capable as people hold him to be, he should have left long ago. The narrator then reveals that during his stay at Starkfield, he “lodged with a middle-aged colloquially known as Mrs. Ned Hale,” whose father was a prominent lawyer. He then remarks that most members of Starkfield were relatively indifferent to the suffering of others, as each person had their own fair share. However, “Ethan Frome’s had been beyond the common measure,” and adding to the confusion, “no one gave me an explanation of the look in his face which … neither poverty nor physical suffering could have put there.” Later, in the middle of the winter, the narrator’s horses became sick due to a local epidemic, and Harmon Gow suggested that he could tell Ethan (whose horses were perfectly healthy) that he would pay him some money if he would drive him to his destination. Harmon Gow then remarked that Ethan would appreciate the money, seeing his extreme misfortune: “‘ … his folks ate up most everything, even then, and I don’t see how he makes out now.’” Harmon Gow then provided a cohesive narrative of Ethan’s life: “‘Fust his father got a kick, out haying, and went soft in the brain, and gave away money like Bible texts before he died. Then his mother got queer and dragged along for years as weak as a baby; and his wife Zeena, she’s always been the greatest hand at doctoring in the county.’”
The narrator then contacted Ethan, and Ethan agreed, and for a full week he would drive the narrator to Corbury Flats in the morning and in the afternoon. “Ethan Frome drove in silence, the reins loosely held in his left hand, his brown seamed profile, under the helmet-like peak of the cap, relieved against the banks of snow like the bronze image of a hero. He never turned his face to mine, or answered, except in monosyllables.” The narrator then remarked that Ethan “seemed a part of the mute melancholy landscape, an incarnation of its frozen woe, with all that was harm and sentient in him fast bound below the surface; but there was nothing unfriendly in his silence.” The narrator then mentioned that he believed Ethan had to be resilient to provide for his family for so long that he became emotionally numb. One time, when he left a book on science behind, Ethan expressed interest, so the narrator told him to keep it. One week after Ethan began providing the narrator with transportation, there was a terrible snow storm. Unsurprisingly, Ethan showed up at the appointed time, seeing that “He was not the kind of man to be turned from his business by any commotion of the elements.” Ethan then told the narrator that he will get him to his destination via the fastest route, which coincidentally goes past his home. When they got to his house, a “droning voice” told them to enter, and then Ethan Frome’s story is told by a third-person narrator.
The story of Ethan’s life begins while he was still young and was waiting for Mattie, his wife’s cousin, beautiful and energetic, who was dancing in a church, to finish. Mattie lived with Zeena and Ethan to help Zeena do the chores, and she had lived with them for a year. It is also apparent that Ethan has romantic feelings for Mattie, from the first moment they met. They both were compatible when it came to their interests, as “She had an eye to see and an ear to hear: he could show her things and tell her things, and taste the bliss of feeling that all he imparted left long reverberations and echoes he could wake at will.” They also enjoyed stargazing at constellations, which only made them closer. Though Ethan is an upright man, when it came to Mattie, he was filled with jealousy whenever he felt she expressed interest in other people, as he wanted her for himself and himself alone. When Mattie finished dancing and accompanied Ethan back to his house, they talked about where she might go once Zeena has no more use of her (Zeena suspects that Ethan likes Mattie, causing her to dislike her even more), and Mattie becomes emotional, saying that there is no place for her to go save Ethan’s home. Ethan then reassures her, telling her that “‘we’ll never let you go,’” and they arrive to see Zeena. Once at home, the key, which was usually under the mat of the door, was gone, and they both panic to some degree. Zeena then opened the door, revealing her “high-boned face,” implying that she removed the key to keep Ethan and Mattie on their toes, and to show that she knows what they might be doing. Soon after, Zeena said that she will be going to a new doctor to treat her symptoms, as “‘I’ve got my shooting pains so bad that I’m going over to Bettsbridge to spend the night with Aunt Martha Pierce and see that new doctor.’” Ethan then remarks that Zeena’s “abrupt decisions were not without precedent,” even when in contrast to her usual sedentary existence, as “Twice or thrice before she had suddenly packed Ethan’s valise and started off to Bettsbridge, or even Springfield, to seek the advice of some new doctor, and her husband had grown to dread these expeditions because of their cost.” After Zeena leaves, Ethan’s mood improves, as he wouldn’t have to fear her nagging attitude. Ethan then, coincidentally, went to the graveyard, and he saw the funeral epitaph for his parents: “Sacred to the memory of Ethan Frome and Endurance his wife, who dwelled together in peace for fifty years.” It is quite ironic that Ethan shares the same name with his father, which goes on to reinforce the atmosphere of Starkfield - it never changes, and exists in a separate world than what most would call reality. Ethan, after reading the epitaph, thought how he “used to think that fifty years sounded like a long time to live together; but now it seemed to him that they might pass in a flash.” Ethan then thought “with a sudden dart of irony” that it was possible in the future for him and Zeena to share the same epitaph.
While Mattie was managing the house, she played with a cat named Puss. Then misfortunate struck: she broke a pickle dish which Zeena valued greatly. Ethan, afraid, still managed sounding like an authority figure, deciding to reconfigure the pieces of the dish as well as he could manage. He then put the remnants into its original position, hoping that when Zeena returned she wouldn’t notice, considering the fact that she rarely used the pickle dish to begin with. He then planned to get some glue if he could, and if he was lucky, he might be “able to match the dish at Shadd’s Falls or Brettsbridge.” Ethan, reassured, “went back to the kitchen with a lighter step, and found Mattie disconsolately removing the last scraps of pickle from the floor.” After that was dealt with, Ethan and Mattie spent some time together, and only when Mattie retired to her room did Ethan remember that “he had not even touched her hand.” The next day, Ethan made arrangements to get a replica of the pickle dish as fast as he can with a man named Jotham. When Zeena returned, he still didn't get the dish, and Zeena told him some stern news: the doctor she had seen recommends that she get an operation to deal with her health. Ethan becomes angry when Zeena said that she lost her health while nursing Ethan’s mother, and he becomes even angrier when she makes sardonic remarks, seeing that “‘You know I haven’t got the money to pay for a girl.’” For the first time in his marriage with Zeena, which lasted 7 years, Ethan becomes angry with her, as when Zeena said that she had been “slaving” away to keep the house running, Ethan said that he would do all the work in the house himself. Zeena, unwilling to stop, told him that he was neglecting the farm already, and that if he wanted to, he could send her to an almshouse. Ethan, though irritated, didn't resort to violence, and told Zeena that he didn't have any money to pay for her operation, and that she had to deal with her poor health the best way she could. When Zeena seriously proposed sending Mattie away, Ethan becomes enraged, though he translates his emotion into words instead of blows, though his words did contain “rising vehemence”: “‘You can’t put her out of the house like a thief - a poor girl without friends or money. She’s done her best for you and she’s got no place to go to. You may forget she’s your kin but everybody else’ll remember it. If you do a thing like that what do you suppose folks’ll say of you?’” Zeena then said she had done her part, and Ethan is pushed to the limit: “Ethan looked at her with loathing. She was no longer the listless creature who had lived at his side in a state of sullen self-absorption, but a mysterious alien presence, an evil energy secreted from the long years of silent brooding. It was the sense of his helplessness that sharpened his antipathy … Now she had mastered him and he abhorred her. Mattie was her relation, not his.” Zeena then proceeded to go into her room to rest, and when Mattie asked if Zeena was sick, Ethan said that she wasn’t. They eventually come to talk about where Mattie would stay once she leaves, and Ethan, for the first time, feels like he has done enough of what he was supposed to do - he wants to do what he wants for once: “‘You can’t go, Matt! I won’t let you! She’s always had her way, but I mean to have mine now-’”. Zeena then unexpectedly appeared and found the broken pickle dish, and told Mattie that she made a mistake taking her in, and that she should never have been foolish enough to do so, as her father was a wreck.
Ethan, deciding firmly to rid himself of his shrewish, annoying wife, decided to go to Mr. Hale, a customer, and ask for an advance payment, which he would then use to escape Starkfield with Mattie. When he went to see Mr. Hale, Mrs. Hale told him that Mr. Hale woke up sick, and was in bed. Then Mrs. Hale, unsuspecting of Ethan’s dilemma, greeted him in a friendly manner, telling him that she felt a lot of sympathy for him, as Ethan acted as an honorable, responsible man despite his terribly bad luck. Ethan, full of shame at the thought of exploiting people and abandoning his integrity and honor, gave upon his plan of rebellion, and saw accurately that “He was a poor man, the husband of a sickly woman, whom his desertion would leave alone and destitute; and even if he had had the heart to desert her he could have done so only by deceiving two kindly people who had pitied him.” After thinking this, “He turned and walked slowly back to the farm.”
Once Ethan got home, he found Mattie sad at the thought of having to leave, and decided to spend some time with her before her departure to a train station. She reveals her deep love for Ethan, telling him that “‘There’s never anybody been good to me but you,’” and that she could never love anyone else as much as she loves him. Ethan also remarked in the conversation, foreshadowing what was going to happen, that he would “‘rather have you dead’” than married. Mattie then decides that a life without Ethan isn’t a life worth living, and tells him that they should kill themselves by driving their sled into a tree: “‘Right into the big elm. You said you could. So ‘t we’d never have to leave each other any more.’” Ethan, though hesitant, upon hearing Mattie’s words, knows that “The words were like fragments torn from his heart. With them came the hated vision of the house he was going back to - of the stairs he would have to go up every night, of the woman who would wait for him there. And the sweetness of Mattie’s avowal, the wild owner of knowing at last that all that had happened to him had happened to her too, made the other vision more abhorrent, the other life more interolable to return to.” Ethan then agrees to Mattie’s plan, and they proceed to end their lives. However, “as they flew toward the tree” and their deaths, Ethan, who was driving, became momentarily distracted by “his wife’s face, with twisted monstrous lineaments.” Ethan then shooed the thought away, and brought his attention back to what he was doing, as “he righted it again, kept it straight, and drove down on the black projecting mass.” When Ethan and Mattie collided with the tree, the collision was terribly violent, but they both survived - Ethan suffered from a limp for the rest of his life, and Mattie was permanently disabled.
The book then focuses on the original first-person narrator once more, and the narrator remarked that as he entered Frome’s house, “The querulous drone ceased as I entered Frome’s kitchen, and of the two women sitting there I could not tell which had been the speaker.” One of the women in the room was mobile, and had a “tall bony figure.” The said figure also had “pale opaque eyes which revealed nothing and reflected nothing, and her narrow lips were of the same sallow colour as her face.” The other woman in the room ”was much smaller and slighter,” and “sat huddled in an arm-chair near the stove.” While the second woman’s upper body was capable of movement, her lower half was paralyzed, and “Her hair was as grey as her companion’s, her face as bloodless and shrivelled, but amber-tinted, with swarthy shadows sharpening the nose and hollowing the temples.” Then what had once been Mattie spoke, in a “high thin” voice: “‘It’s on’y just been made up this very minute. Zeena fell asleep and slep’ ever so long, and I thought I’d be frozen stiff before I could wake her up and get to ‘tend to it.’” The narrator then talked to Mrs. Hale, a “tender soul,” who described Mattie’s recovery: “‘It was just awful from the beginning. I was here in the house when they were carried up.’” Mrs. Hale then proceeded, saying ironically that after Ethan and Mattie were both seriously injured (permanently), Zeena was able to care for them relatively well, seeing that she was the cause of their misery. Zeena was then described as having cared for them for 20 years, showing that the extent of her disease was definitely exaggerated. Mrs. Hale then remarked that Mattie should have died in the accident, as her life afterwards was terrible and her personality changed for the worse: “‘Mattie was, before the accident; I never knew a sweeter nature. But she’s suffered too much - that’s what I always say when folks tell me how she’s soured. And Zeena, she was always cranky … the two of them get going at each other, and then Ethan’s face’d break your heart … I think it’s him that suffers most.’” Even worse, Mattie’s paralyzed body has made it next-to-impossible for her to enjoy life, seeing that she’s stuck in the kitchen for much of her time, while “‘In the summertime, on pleasant days,’” Mattie is moved “‘into the parlour, or out in the door-yard, and that makes it easier.’” The book ends with the following quote, which should be quoted in the original text to reflect how poor the quality of Ethan’s life is: “‘There was one day, about a week after the accident, when they all thought Mattie couldn’t live. Well, I say it’s a pity she did … And I say, if she’d h’ died, Ethan mighta ha’ lived; and the way they are now, I don’t see there’s much difference between the Fromes up at the farm and the Fromes down in the graveyard; ‘cept that down there they’re all quiet, and the women have got to hold their tongues.’”
Personal thoughts:
When I was instructed to read Ethan Frome in 10th grade, I was stunned by the poor ratings that this book received on some media platforms, for if a book is viewed poorly, why should it be read widely? My initial expectations were soon proven to be inaccurate, though not immediately. After I finished reading the book, I felt confused, as it felt to be too short. Only months later, when I recollect on the book, do I see its true beauty - while Ethan Frome is indeed a strange read, it is an enlightening one, for I see it as representing life, as well as dashed expectations. I appreciate how Ethan Frome portrays the characters, as they are realistic and sympathetic - while I did feel disgust with Zeena, I do sympathize with her - when you are sick, the only thing of real importance is recovery. I do feel great sympathy for Ethan and Mattie, for in my opinion, they should have enjoyed each other’s company, though not without Ethan explaining to Zeena the entire situation. And that is another point of genius in this book - there is no easy solution for Ethan’s dilemma, as he is a poor man and could barely support any of them. The ending of the book affected me deeply, for I agree with the sentiments of Mrs. Hale, for it would have been better for Mattie to have died rather than to survive as a cripple, and it was painful to read how she changed for the worse due to her condition. I highly recommend Ethan Frome for those interested in small-town America, fate, human choice, and conflicts which embody the infamous phrase “between Scylla and Charybdis.”
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