Status
Available
Call number
Call number
F Wha
Genres
Collection
Publication
New York, NY : Scribner Paperpack Fiction, 1997.
Description
Ethan Frome, a poor, downtrodden New England farmer is trapped in a loveless marriage to his invalid wife, Zeena. His ambition and intelligence are oppressed by Zeena's cold, conniving character. When Zeena's young cousin Mattie arrives to help care for her, Ethan is immediately taken by Mattie's warm, vivacious personality. They fall desperately in love as he realizes how much is missing from his life and marriage. Tragically, their love is doomed by Zeena's ever-lurking presence and by the social conventions of the day. Ethan remains torn between his sense of obligation and his urge to satisfy his heart's desire up to the suspenseful and unanticipated conclusion.
Media reviews
It will only take you the afternoon, but it’s shocking snowy ending will leave you pondering it for days.
Subjects
Original publication date
1911
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User reviews
LibraryThing member Smiler69
"I had the story, bit by bit, from various people, and as generally happens in such cases, each time it was a different story. If you know Starkfield, Massachusetts, you know the post-office. If you know the post-office you must have seen Ethan Frome drive up to it, drop the reins on his
The narrator goes on to tell us the story of Ethan Frome, who had great aspirations as a young man, with hopes of having a brilliant career and moving to a big city. But first with his sick parents, and then Zenobia, the woman who helped him care for them—whom he was trapped into marrying and who then went on to become a self-pitying and difficult invalid who sought expensive cures—Ethan had little hope of escaping the ancestral home and the poverty that his doomed farm and marriage constrained him to. When Zeena's cheerful first cousin Mattie comes to the farm to help with the household chores in the heart of a bitterly cold winter, Ethan can't help but bask in her warmth. He starts dreaming of a better life again, and together they share a brief and chaste romance which, in this puritanical place, is bound to spell disaster. This is great writing by Wharton, and though the story might be glum, the characters and their opposing motivations form an unforgettable love triangle in a human drama which I found almost comical for the extreme state of hopelessness into which the protagonists are plunged, seemingly for all eternity (but that's just me). The introduction by Elizabeth Ammons in the Penguin Classics Deluxe edition, which I read after taking in the novel, goes on to explain how it drew on Wharton's personal experiences, even though based on first impressions, one might think Ethan Frome was a complete departure from her writing about the cosseted upper classes she belonged to. For example, the mysterious ailments Zenobia suffers from appear to be derived directly from the author's own struggles with depression for which Wharton sought treatment in the mid-1890s:
"She suffered from nausea, weight loss, extreme fatigue, headaches, and profound despondency. At the time, the standard diagnosis for such symptoms was neurasthenia, sometimes called hysteria, and the treatment, as Wharton's contemporary Charlotte Perkins Gilman chronicled in her famous 1892 story, [The Yellow Wallpaper], was known as the rest cure. The prescribe therapy involved total bed rest, preferably in a hospital, hotel, or sanitarium, where the patient was fed, bathed, given douches and enemas, massaged, and in every other way kept dependent and completely immobile for weeks or, if necessary, months. This program of rest required removal from all exciting or upsetting stimuli such as newspapers, magazines, books, letters, visitors, or any other activity requiring mental of physical exertions, no matter how mild, including writing, sewing, and drawing. The rest cure aimed to create a healing calm so that the patient could regain mental health. For Gilman, as her short story records, it was a recipe for insanity [and no wonder!]. But for Wharton, the regimen she experienced as an outpatient had a beneficial effect. In large part she recovered because he physician, unlike Gilman's, encouraged her to pursue her writing, which she avidly did."
It seems that the notion of infidelity was also drawn from personal experiences. As Wharton and her husband Teddy's unhappy marriage fell apart, each struggling with depression and with Teddy having several affairs, Edith Wharton also broke her marriage vows and "had a secret and passionate love affair with a slightly younger man, Morton Fullerton, from about 1907 to 1910. As she related it [in documents she explicitly left in a sealed packed labeled, in her own hand "For My Biographer], the affair exposed her for the first and only time in her life to intense, fulfilling, erotic passion, a realitiy that respectable late-era Victorian women such as Wharton, brought up to believe sex a necessary and unspeakable evil, where not supposed to experience. The affair ended in 1910. A year later she wrote Ethan Frome and in 1913 filed for divorce."
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hollow-back bay and drag himself across the brick pavement to the white colonnade; and you must have asked who he was. It was there that, several years ago, I saw him for the first time; and the sight pulled me up sharp. Even then he was the most striking figure in Starkfield, though he was but the ruin of a man. It was not so much his great height that marked him, for the "natives" were easily singled out by their lank longitude from the stockier foreign breed: it was the careless powerful look he had, in spite of a lameness checking each step like the jerk of a chain. There was something bleak and unapproachable in his face, and he was so stiffened and grizzled that I took him for an old man and was surprised to hear that he was no more than fifty-two."The narrator goes on to tell us the story of Ethan Frome, who had great aspirations as a young man, with hopes of having a brilliant career and moving to a big city. But first with his sick parents, and then Zenobia, the woman who helped him care for them—whom he was trapped into marrying and who then went on to become a self-pitying and difficult invalid who sought expensive cures—Ethan had little hope of escaping the ancestral home and the poverty that his doomed farm and marriage constrained him to. When Zeena's cheerful first cousin Mattie comes to the farm to help with the household chores in the heart of a bitterly cold winter, Ethan can't help but bask in her warmth. He starts dreaming of a better life again, and together they share a brief and chaste romance which, in this puritanical place, is bound to spell disaster. This is great writing by Wharton, and though the story might be glum, the characters and their opposing motivations form an unforgettable love triangle in a human drama which I found almost comical for the extreme state of hopelessness into which the protagonists are plunged, seemingly for all eternity (but that's just me). The introduction by Elizabeth Ammons in the Penguin Classics Deluxe edition, which I read after taking in the novel, goes on to explain how it drew on Wharton's personal experiences, even though based on first impressions, one might think Ethan Frome was a complete departure from her writing about the cosseted upper classes she belonged to. For example, the mysterious ailments Zenobia suffers from appear to be derived directly from the author's own struggles with depression for which Wharton sought treatment in the mid-1890s:
"She suffered from nausea, weight loss, extreme fatigue, headaches, and profound despondency. At the time, the standard diagnosis for such symptoms was neurasthenia, sometimes called hysteria, and the treatment, as Wharton's contemporary Charlotte Perkins Gilman chronicled in her famous 1892 story, [The Yellow Wallpaper], was known as the rest cure. The prescribe therapy involved total bed rest, preferably in a hospital, hotel, or sanitarium, where the patient was fed, bathed, given douches and enemas, massaged, and in every other way kept dependent and completely immobile for weeks or, if necessary, months. This program of rest required removal from all exciting or upsetting stimuli such as newspapers, magazines, books, letters, visitors, or any other activity requiring mental of physical exertions, no matter how mild, including writing, sewing, and drawing. The rest cure aimed to create a healing calm so that the patient could regain mental health. For Gilman, as her short story records, it was a recipe for insanity [and no wonder!]. But for Wharton, the regimen she experienced as an outpatient had a beneficial effect. In large part she recovered because he physician, unlike Gilman's, encouraged her to pursue her writing, which she avidly did."
It seems that the notion of infidelity was also drawn from personal experiences. As Wharton and her husband Teddy's unhappy marriage fell apart, each struggling with depression and with Teddy having several affairs, Edith Wharton also broke her marriage vows and "had a secret and passionate love affair with a slightly younger man, Morton Fullerton, from about 1907 to 1910. As she related it [in documents she explicitly left in a sealed packed labeled, in her own hand "For My Biographer], the affair exposed her for the first and only time in her life to intense, fulfilling, erotic passion, a realitiy that respectable late-era Victorian women such as Wharton, brought up to believe sex a necessary and unspeakable evil, where not supposed to experience. The affair ended in 1910. A year later she wrote Ethan Frome and in 1913 filed for divorce."
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LibraryThing member Dorritt
This book reminds me forcefully of the Greek tragedies one reads in college. From the very first pages you can see the calamity coming, but there's nothing anyone can do - not Ethan Frome, the tragic hero of this tale; not the tale's author, Edith Wharton; and certainly not the reader - to prevent
Like a short story, the novel limits iteslf to just a few characters, a single plot, and a single theme - one even older than Greek tragedy: Ethan Frome, a simple Massachusetts farmer, finds himself married to one woman but in love with another.
You see the tragedy coming because such tales never come to a good end in real life either.
Frome's tragic flaw (Aristotle requires a fatal flaw, after all) is one that most of us probably share - believing that we have some sort of right to happiness. Alas, as this tale reminds us, fate doesn't always work that way.
Edith Wharton delivers the tale starkly, handing the narrative over to her characters and then stepping back to let them tell the tale in their own way. This has the effect of intensifying the feeling of mounting dread, because it eliminates, early on, any hope or expectation of intervention by an empathetic narrator. And since this isn't actually a Greek drama, there isn't much hope of divine intervention either.
If catharsis is as good for your soul as the Greeks posited, then you're bound to feel thoroughly cleansed after this well-crafted but bleak tale.
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it from unfolding.Like a short story, the novel limits iteslf to just a few characters, a single plot, and a single theme - one even older than Greek tragedy: Ethan Frome, a simple Massachusetts farmer, finds himself married to one woman but in love with another.
You see the tragedy coming because such tales never come to a good end in real life either.
Frome's tragic flaw (Aristotle requires a fatal flaw, after all) is one that most of us probably share - believing that we have some sort of right to happiness. Alas, as this tale reminds us, fate doesn't always work that way.
Edith Wharton delivers the tale starkly, handing the narrative over to her characters and then stepping back to let them tell the tale in their own way. This has the effect of intensifying the feeling of mounting dread, because it eliminates, early on, any hope or expectation of intervention by an empathetic narrator. And since this isn't actually a Greek drama, there isn't much hope of divine intervention either.
If catharsis is as good for your soul as the Greeks posited, then you're bound to feel thoroughly cleansed after this well-crafted but bleak tale.
Show Less
LibraryThing member lauralkeet
Despite being a huge Edith Wharton fan, I put off reading this book for years. I picked it up after reading Henry James’ Daisy Miller, to see how Wharton handled a short novel about love and loss. The two novels deal with somewhat different themes, but Wharton’s treatment is far superior. Ethan
The afternoon was drawing to an end, and here and there a lighted pane spangled the cold grey dusk and made the snow look whiter. The bitter weather had driven everyone indoors and Ethan had the long rural street to himself. Suddenly he heard the brisk play of sleigh-bells and a cutter passed him, drawn by a free-going horse.
When Zeena travels overnight to see a doctor in another town, Ethan and Mattie spend their first evening alone sitting in front of the fire enjoying one another’s company. But when Zeena returns, the romantic tension between Ethan and Mattie is palpable, and not lost on Zeena. Manipulative and determined, Zeena sets events in motion that change their lives forever.
I’m amazed that in just 100 pages I became so emotionally invested in the fates of Ethan, Mattie, and Zeena. This is not a happy story, but it is brilliantly written.
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Frome’s hypochondriac wife Zeena is needy and bed-ridden, and takes Ethan for granted. His days are enlivened by Mattie Silver, a destitute cousin who manages the household in exchange for room and board. Wharton paints a vivid scene of Frome’s isolated New England farmhouse in the middle of a snowy winter, with horse-drawn carriages taking people and goods to and from the town:The afternoon was drawing to an end, and here and there a lighted pane spangled the cold grey dusk and made the snow look whiter. The bitter weather had driven everyone indoors and Ethan had the long rural street to himself. Suddenly he heard the brisk play of sleigh-bells and a cutter passed him, drawn by a free-going horse.
When Zeena travels overnight to see a doctor in another town, Ethan and Mattie spend their first evening alone sitting in front of the fire enjoying one another’s company. But when Zeena returns, the romantic tension between Ethan and Mattie is palpable, and not lost on Zeena. Manipulative and determined, Zeena sets events in motion that change their lives forever.
I’m amazed that in just 100 pages I became so emotionally invested in the fates of Ethan, Mattie, and Zeena. This is not a happy story, but it is brilliantly written.
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LibraryThing member BlackSheepDances
Deceptively short, deceptively simple. Don't miss this fantastic novella, that shows how one bad decision can affect a lifetime. "Marry in haste, repent at leisure" is best personified in this book.
It's a perfect cold weather read, and take your time to enjoy the characters. Ethan Frome is a strong
Don't give up on this, because the story has one of the greatest twists in modern English literature. Don't assume too much as you read, as you will be wrong. I made both my sons read this...I think any young man should.
It's a perfect cold weather read, and take your time to enjoy the characters. Ethan Frome is a strong
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man, and despite his disability, you see strength. But as you read more you see that a tremendous weakness on his part, far in the past, affected his entire life.Don't give up on this, because the story has one of the greatest twists in modern English literature. Don't assume too much as you read, as you will be wrong. I made both my sons read this...I think any young man should.
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LibraryThing member Ameliaiif
Okay, so once I got over my temper tatrum at my professor's effrontery to make me read for class, I actually liked this book! Now, that's saying something, because usually I grade classics just like I would any other book - none of this: "Ohhh, gee, Author Person! You're book is all kinds of
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wonderful just because IT'S OLD and lots of people have to write term papers over it!" Nope. The funny thing that I can't get over is that I absolutely HATE books like this one: not a whole lot of action, really indecisive characters, circumstances that are not overcome, etc. And yet Ethan Frome really got to me. I read the whole thing kicking and screaming, saying "No! I WILL NOT like this book! You can't make me!" but it was no use. Here's the scoop (and it's a pretty easy scoop): A poor farmer with an ultra-whiny hypochondriac wife (or at least that's my professor's interpretation) live with the ultra-whiny wife's pretty and vivacious cousin, and the poor downtrodden farmer falls in love with the enchanting cousin (Mattie) but can't seem to escape his circumstances. That's it. And yet, there's so much more. I don't like Ethan, I certainly don't like Zeena...Mattie's really the only character I truly liked...and yet I cared about them all and was rooting for Ethan even though he's such a dadgum loser! Maybe my parents were a little too into the whole "pull yourself up by your bootstraps, kids!!!" growing up but I really felt like circumstances weren't near as bleak as Ethan made them out to be. We talked about that a lot in class today: psychological realism novels are really big into the whole "appearances vs. reality" scenario, and I just found that so intriguing. I hate to admit it, but I found myself wishing Ethan and Mattie would just elope and get it over with, and a pox on that scurvy Zeena! Maybe that's why this book is a classic: it's so incredibly simple, and yet by the time you're finished, you feel emotionally exhausted. This book doesn't make you feel better about yourself or life (unless you thank God you're not operating a sawmill in Starkfield, MA in the winter!) and I'm still not entirely sure what message (if any) Edith Wharton was trying to send, but the story just captivated me. Now granted, this is NOT the type of thing I look for in outside fun-reading, but I'm glad I had the experience. It's like when you're in a bookstore or a library and you pass a classic, you can beam with pride and point and declare, "I READ THAT!" So thank you, Dr. Bruce, and thank you to my mom who is an English teacher/principal who let me use her teaching copy - the one with all the notes and unlined passages. :D - Definitely recommended to Classics Lovers. And if you're a student and you find Ethan Frome on your "Required Reading" syllabus, don't fret, for this is an easy read. It could be a heck of a lot worse. *thinks of T.S. Eliot and shivers* Show Less
LibraryThing member justjukka
I enjoyed invasive oral surgery more than I enjoyed reading this book. All three of them, actually. The first one made me rather sick, due to the general anesthesia. At least the dentist provided anesthetics during the procedure. There was nothing dulling the pain of reading this book. It should
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NOT be on the required reading list for any high school. Show Less
LibraryThing member stephcan13
The quiet, dark, cold world of longing that Wharton lulls us into in Ethan Frome is just as irresistable to me now as it was over a decade ago, when I read this short novel for the first time. The world she creates of plain, ordinary people and their plain, ordinary drama could easy fall flat in
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another author's hands, yet Wharton manages to execute a simple, and ultimately sad story in such an eloquent matter that these "simple" country women and men's lives take on a fascinating qualtiy to be rivaled by the wealthiest socialites and celebrities. Most impressive is her ability to use setting--a brutal northern winter--to reinforce the joy and hopelessness the main characters experience; thus setting becomes a dominant force, if not a character, unto itself. I adore this book and highly recommend it to everyone. Show Less
LibraryThing member k6gst
Louis Auchincloss, a favorite of mine, thought very highly of Edith Wharton, and wrote a short biography. They were from the same world, though separated by a couple of generations.
I found this charmer about doomed, wasted lives, forbidden passion, and deathwish tobogganing in the bleakest patch
The ending is a bang-up twist.
I enjoyed it, but I’m ready to read about rich people’s problems again.
I found this charmer about doomed, wasted lives, forbidden passion, and deathwish tobogganing in the bleakest patch
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of late 19th century New England to be more fun when I read the dialogue aloud in an old-timey Yankee accent. The ending is a bang-up twist.
I enjoyed it, but I’m ready to read about rich people’s problems again.
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LibraryThing member London_StJ
What I find most striking about Ethan Frome is not the story itself, which is fairly simple, but Wharton's ability to inspire such strong emotions in the reader. Like the narrator, I found myself captivated by the stooped figure of Ethan himself, and I, too, soon felt a burning desire to discover
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the "mystery" of his condition. When faced with Ethan's life I was horrified, repulsed at times, and ever grateful for my own existence. I felt nearly instant loathing for Zeena Frome, and suspense every time Ethan set out - sure that this would hold the answer. The conclusion startled me, but did nothing to alleviate the negative emotions the narrative itself inspired, leaving a lasting impression on me as a reader. Show Less
LibraryThing member 1Owlette
One of my all-time favourite novels, this beautifully written, spare tale of wasted lives and lost dreams has stayed with me for many years. The character of Ethan, an imperfect man with longings for something larger that he can sometimes glimpse, is one of the most moving in fiction.
LibraryThing member justmeRosalie
This is my absolute favorite work of all time. It is so haunting. Wharton's writing skill has such an incredible ability to draw you into the setting, Cold, fultility, and loneliness cause you to feel crisp freezing nights and sense the breathtaking power in nature. Descriptions of the landscapes
Ethan falls in love with his wife's cousin who comes to help out when the wife is taken ill. The story is very realistically tragic.. It took me awhile to figure out the theme of this novel. Like the characters, I wondered what was going on and why. Wharton writes beautifully, portraying a sadness that is universal. It is Wharton at her best.
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are incredible.Ethan falls in love with his wife's cousin who comes to help out when the wife is taken ill. The story is very realistically tragic.. It took me awhile to figure out the theme of this novel. Like the characters, I wondered what was going on and why. Wharton writes beautifully, portraying a sadness that is universal. It is Wharton at her best.
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LibraryThing member MichelleCH
How sad and tragic can one book be? So much so that you think about it for days and days.
This is also a member of the “finish it and then pick it up again and start at the beginning” book group. It is like the pain that feels good.
Tragic Ethan Frome; he marries his cousin Zeena just because she
Mattie is a breath of fresh air in Ethan’s life. She is young, innocent and attractive, and of course, very much off limits. She has a complicated past and not a lot of options. Slowly Ethan becomes infatuated and then in love with her.
Wharton beautifully lets you live their love and difficult decisions. I am not sure if Ethan is really as trapped as he feels himself to be. Wharton explores this through the story and allows each to decide. Was the love of Ethan and Mattie doomed or were there other options there? The story is dark and cold, just like the winter in the Massachusetts town where they live.
The ending is very Twilight Zonish. The most impossible and long-lasting punishment I have ever read.
This is also a member of the “finish it and then pick it up again and start at the beginning” book group. It is like the pain that feels good.
Tragic Ethan Frome; he marries his cousin Zeena just because she
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is there. I did not like Zeena. She was much too whiny and a dead-weight on the marriage. Zeena eventually developed a strong case of hypochondria, and needed the help of an aide to get along day-to-day. What was interesting was how she made this switch to dependency so rapidly after marrying Ethan. This is where Mattie, Zeena's cousin, comes in. Mattie comes to live with Ethan and Zeena to help out around the house.Mattie is a breath of fresh air in Ethan’s life. She is young, innocent and attractive, and of course, very much off limits. She has a complicated past and not a lot of options. Slowly Ethan becomes infatuated and then in love with her.
Wharton beautifully lets you live their love and difficult decisions. I am not sure if Ethan is really as trapped as he feels himself to be. Wharton explores this through the story and allows each to decide. Was the love of Ethan and Mattie doomed or were there other options there? The story is dark and cold, just like the winter in the Massachusetts town where they live.
The ending is very Twilight Zonish. The most impossible and long-lasting punishment I have ever read.
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LibraryThing member ravingraven
I do not recommend this book. If you want to read an Edith Wharton novel, read the Age of Innocence. If you already have read the Age of Innocence and want to read Ethan Frome, read the Age of Innocence again.
Ethan Frome was difficult to finish. Although considered a classic, this is a book I
Ethan Frome was difficult to finish. Although considered a classic, this is a book I
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would not read again. Honestly, I wish I could forget Ethan Frome. Show Less
LibraryThing member japaul22
This was different than I expected. Ethan Frome is a short novel, almost more of a short story in its focus on the lead up to a single disastrous event. Ethan Frome is an silent, old man with an almost failing farm and an old injury when we meet him at the beginning of the book. Then we get to hear
It's all very hard to describe without giving away the plot, so I'll just say that I liked it. It's not my favorite Wharton, but it's a powerful, focused book that works really well. I found it strikingly different from her other works that I've read with its rural setting and male focus but it definitely still fits in with her other work in terms of unhappy marriage!
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the story leading up to his injury. You see Ethan Frome as a young man and a glimpse of what his life could have been. The whole thing is pretty depressing, especially when you are thrust back to the present day and realize what all the characters are like now. It's all very hard to describe without giving away the plot, so I'll just say that I liked it. It's not my favorite Wharton, but it's a powerful, focused book that works really well. I found it strikingly different from her other works that I've read with its rural setting and male focus but it definitely still fits in with her other work in terms of unhappy marriage!
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LibraryThing member jnwelch
Hard to believe Ethan Frome was written by the same author as Age of Innocence. This 1911 novel is set in the New England town of Starkfield. Farmer Ethan is the physically twisted survivor of a mysterious "smash-up" many years prior, and through the narration of a man who comes to know him, we
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find out what happened. Ethan has a difficult, hypochondriac wife, and unfulfilled dreams of becoming an engineer. Poverty dogs their life. When a young girl relative is sent to help around their house, Ethan feels romantic stirrings and reminders of what his life might have been. The "stark" story and its outcome are haunting. A compelling and sobering read. Show Less
LibraryThing member ysar
Tragically and simply romantic, this is one of my favorite books of all-time. Nothing terribly exciting happens...there's no big drama or action. It's just a simple story about simple people with feelings that cannot be acted upon. I can't really describe why this book drew me in. On the surface,
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it's depressing and bleak, but there is a depth to it that is captivating. Show Less
LibraryThing member maryreinert
I love this story which I've read over the years. As a high school student it made an impression as I saw the results of an unfulfilled life; a life of self imposed narrowness. In a strange way it taught me to take advantage of opportunities. Reading it again years later, the sadness is even more
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profound. How many lives have been spent in self-created misery. So often unspoken words have a greater affect on lives than those that are uttered. A great piece of writing. Show Less
LibraryThing member GBev2008
Wharton is a very good writer and most of the book was pretty compelling, but all the melodrama at the end was a little hard to swallow.
Well written, but certainly not the classic I was led to believe.
Well written, but certainly not the classic I was led to believe.
LibraryThing member kristi25
The unnamed narrator is visiting Starkfield, and comes across one of its inhabitants, a crippled and broken-spirited man, Ethan Frome. Ethan is hired to take the man to the train station and a snow storm forces them to stay at Ethan's home through the night. The narrator begins to piece together
Ethan Frome was my first experience with Edith Wharton. This story is tragic as are all of Wharton's novels from what I have heard, but was beautifully written. I could feel the desperation of the situation of all of them involved. It is a short and quick read, but after I had finished it, the story stuck with me. If you're not afraid of tragic endings, I would highly recommend Ethan Frome.
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the story of the heartbreak and tragedy that is Ethan's life.Ethan Frome was my first experience with Edith Wharton. This story is tragic as are all of Wharton's novels from what I have heard, but was beautifully written. I could feel the desperation of the situation of all of them involved. It is a short and quick read, but after I had finished it, the story stuck with me. If you're not afraid of tragic endings, I would highly recommend Ethan Frome.
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LibraryThing member bung
This was a refreshing, albeit bleak, read. A cynical criticism of romance, humourous, symbolic, fabulous.
LibraryThing member pickwick817
The beginning of the book sucked me in as I read this one Saturday. An engineer spending time in a dead-end New England town learns about Ethans tragic history and what led him to where he is now.
LibraryThing member soylentgreen23
It's hard to review such a book as this without giving away its ending, and its secrets. It should be enough to say that this is one of the most movingly sad, tragic little books I have ever had the pleasure to come across, and as depressed as I became by the end I'm still exceptionally glad to
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have read it. Show Less
LibraryThing member writestuff
Edith Wharton is at her narrative best in this novel about a young man who falls in love until fate tragically intervenes. Wharton deftly constructs the story by starting a generation after the climax, then weaves her way back to the beginning to unravel the mystery. In doing so, she creates the
Mattie Silver, a young beauty, serves as a sharp contrast to Ethan's wife, Zeena - a bitter, sickly woman who is perhaps more aware of Ethan's feelings than he is of his own. It is no wonder that the reader will find herself hoping for happiness between Ethan and Mattie who seem to be soul-mates:
'And there were other sensations, less definable but more exquisite, which drew them together with a shock of silent joy: the cold red of sunset behind winter hills, the flight of cloud-flocks over slopes of golden stubble, or the intensely blue shadows of hemlocks on sunlit snow.' - From Ethan Frome, page 297 -
Wharton's firm grasp of setting, her understanding of human vulnerability, and her sense of drama all combine to make Ethan Frome a compelling must read.
Highly recommended.
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tension in the novel which keeps the reader obsessively turning the pages.Mattie Silver, a young beauty, serves as a sharp contrast to Ethan's wife, Zeena - a bitter, sickly woman who is perhaps more aware of Ethan's feelings than he is of his own. It is no wonder that the reader will find herself hoping for happiness between Ethan and Mattie who seem to be soul-mates:
'And there were other sensations, less definable but more exquisite, which drew them together with a shock of silent joy: the cold red of sunset behind winter hills, the flight of cloud-flocks over slopes of golden stubble, or the intensely blue shadows of hemlocks on sunlit snow.' - From Ethan Frome, page 297 -
Wharton's firm grasp of setting, her understanding of human vulnerability, and her sense of drama all combine to make Ethan Frome a compelling must read.
Highly recommended.
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LibraryThing member AmyLiz
As much as I love Edith Wharton, this is an awful, awful book. I guess every author has a complete miss.
LibraryThing member leelerbaby
Sad tale of a man's life filled with tragedy. After a life of caring for a sick father then mother, Frome marries his wife Zeena out of gratitude for helping care for his mother. Wife turns into a hypochondriac who needs to be cared for by a relative Mattie. Frome finds himself being drawn to
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Mattie and when his wife states that Mattie must leave to be replaced by a girl who is better at taking care of a person, Frome plans to leave with Mattie but out of obligation decides to stay.On the way to taking Mattie to the train station Frome and Mattie confess their love and realize that both can't bare to be parted. They decides to end the problem by sledding into a big elm tree. Tale ends with Frome having limp, Mattie a bitter invalid being taken care of by Frome's wife. A sad tale of new love just realized that turns into regret and burden. Show Less
Pages
150