Ethan Frome

The classic novel of despair, forbidden emotions, and sexual undercurrents set against the austere New England countryside

Ethan Frome works his unproductive farm and struggles to maintain a bearable existence with his difficult, suspicious and hypochondriac wife, Zeena. But when Zeena's vivacious cousin enters their household as a hired girl, Ethan finds himself obsessed with her and with the possibilities for happiness she comes to represent.

In one of American fiction's finest and most intense narratives, Edith Wharton moves this ill-starred trio toward their tragic destinies. Different in both tone and theme from Wharton's other works, Ethan Frome has become perhaps her most enduring and most widely read book.

Genre

Classic Literature

99 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1911

Average Ratings

Goodreads - 3.44

Amazon - 4.4

Storygraph - 3.27

My Verdict

One of the things I want to do this year is to go back and reread some of the classics. That being said, I decided to start with Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton.

At its heart, Ethan Frome is a story about being trapped by circumstance. As such stories so often are, it is largely about yearning for what you cannot have. It is no secret from the beginning that there is no way this can end well. If I had to use one adjective to describe this book, I would choose melancholy.

I had forgotten what a downer this novel is. It is the story of a struggle between opposing wills. In this struggle, do we realize that even failure has a spiritual value? I looked for a sign of spiritual greatness in Ethan and Zeena, but I couldn’t see any. This keeps the book from rising to the level of a tragedy for me. A tragedy aims to reach a state of purification through sacrifice. There is no sacrifice in this story. There’s no death and martyrdom either. And I cannot see any moral lesson to be derived in the end. The lack of moralization, martyrdom and sacrifice leaves me stuck in the face of stark cruelty and inhumaneness.

If there is a tragic hero at all, it is not Ethan or Zeena; it is Mattie. I won't spoil the ending, but when you read it I think you will see that the outcome for Mattie is not a simple tragedy; it is cruelty. This makes me think that Wharton was not looking to give us a moral lesson at all or perhaps, since the novel was written in 1911 it tells us who society at that time was willing to hold responsible. Give it a read and see what you think. I know a lot of ratings on this one are low, but as a retired English teacher I give it 4 stars. I think it's worth a read.