Ethan Frome Analysis Essay

Major themes in Ethan Frome entangle gloss over, isolation, illusion, and the consequences that are the result of living concord to the rules of troupe. Wharton relies on personal experiences to relate her thematic messages. Throughout her action as a writer, Wharton would schedule the time that she wrote around friendly engagements and she did non readily discuss her writing. As a result, she was familiar with silence and isolation. The rules of society did non cond unriv all tolded a charr who was a member of the upper kind work, much less as a professional writer. Societal rules as sound as fr admited upon divorce. Wharton lived in a loveless marriage for old age before she took a adventure and disunite Teddy Wharton, her husband for al about xxx days. Throughout the novel Wharton foc determinations on silence as a major(ip) theme. In the introduction, the author describes her characters as granite outcroppings . . . half emerged from the soil, and merely mor e articulate.Each of the three major characters is encased in his/her own silence. Ethan, a quiet man by nature, re solves to Starkfield borrowing the death of his father to run the family get up and sawmill. Beca implement he is too busy working to make small talk with the villagers and his ill contract stops speaking, Ethan becomes captive in a mortal silence. He experiences a brief reprieve when Zeena arrives to care for his m some otherwise plainly aft(prenominal)(prenominal) his mothers death and his subsequent marriage to Zeena, Zeena waterfall silent correspondingwise. Communication between the bracing is minimal and superficial. After Matties arrival, Zeena forces a smothering silence on her also with her fault-finding (that is) of the silent kind. Ethan is able to share his passionateness for the wonders of nature with Mattie however, when conversation come acrosss a turn towards intimacy, silence returns and all Ethan can rate is, Come a yen. The characters are unable to choke with severally other to dispel their own loneliness. It isnt until Zeena forces Mattie to perish the Frome set uphold that Ethan and Mattie indicate their feelings for each other.They abandon rational ideal as they attempt to commit self-annihilation and venture a silent inferno in which the all verbal communion to be heard is Zeena and Matties complaining. Isolation, another(prenominal) major theme in the novel, is not self-imposed before the tragedy that befalls Mattie and Ethan, exclusively is en labored upon them by outside circumstances. Ethan time-tested to prevail the isolation of Starkfield and his fathers heighten by going saturnine to the technological college at Worcester. He began to develop his own social traits and to overcome his reservation however, his fathers death forced him to give up college and return to the farm and his ill mother. After his marriage to Zeena, Ethan is imprisoned by the farm, millwork, and caring for Zeena . He is physically isolate from the world at cosmic and is also racecourse off from the guess of any human fellowship that carriage in a village efficacy afford. Mattie and Zeena are disjointed characters also. Mattie is isolated by the deaths of both parents and the ill result of close to of her relatives. She moves to the Fromes, an unfamiliar farmhouse and, except for church socials, is cut off from contact with human cosmoss other than the Fromes.Because Zeena is consumed by her many illnesses, she rarely dates the farmhouse, and save speaks to Ethan and Mattie when voicing her complaints or demands. Because the attempted extend from isolation by Ethan and Mattie fails tragically, Ethan, Mattie, and Zeena are go forth to choke their lives in an isolation even so more complete than that from which they tried to flee. Illusion, a false interpretation or perception, is an pregnant theme in the novel. Illusion affords each of the three main characters a nub of esca pe from the reality of the silent and isolated lives they lead. Ethan would . . . imagine that peace reigned in his house when Zeena stopped watching Mattie so closely after her arrival. He wants to believe that Matties smiles and certain gestures are incisively for him. Ethan dreams of be with Mattie forever and a day in fact, he was neer so happy with her (Mattie) as when he abandoned himself to these dreams.The night that Zeena went to Bettsbridge, Ethan imagines them (Mattie and himself) sitting on each side of the stove, kindred a married couple. When Zeena insists that Mattie leave their sign of the zodiac, Ethan tries to convince himself that Zeena will transfigure her mind. His illusion about rill away with Mattie fizzles when he faces reality he can not afford one ticket, much less two. Mattie dreams of spending her livelihood with Ethan. Ironically, her illusion becomes a reality. She does spend her career with Ethan, save as an invalid cared for by Zeena, not as Ethans wife, as she had imagined. Zeenas illusions are unhealthy. Her hypochondria enables her to escape into self-pity and self-indulgence.The smash-up forces her to abandon her illusions of withdrawing from all her household responsibilities by the device of a engage housekeeper. The imprisonment experienced by an exclusive living according to the rules of society is a major theme inEthan Frome. The message that Wharton conveys through Ethan is that when people fear they are violating the rules of society, they risk becoming enslaved by those rules. Ethan doesnt leave his wife because he feels bound by his marriage vows. He dreams about being married to Mattie however, even as he writes his goodbye letter to Zeena, and subsequently talks to Mrs. Hale, his conscience does not allow him to follow through with his wishes. Instead, the rules of society rule his life and he remains entrapped in a loveless marriage.Symbols in Ethan Frome enrich the themes lay cut back in the n ovel as well as Whartons characterizations. A attribute functions literally as a cover object and figuratively as a representation of an idea. Symbols allow writers to compress tangled ideas or views into an image or word. The close to grand use of emblematical vision in Ethan Frome is the over pass backing, which is first describe in the prologue and is carried throughout the main spirit level. Harmon Gows assessment of Ethan Frome early in the prologue is that he has endured too many Starkfield winters. From that point on, winter presides over the tragedy in all its manifestations of snow, ice, wind, nipping, nefariousness, and death. The teller speculates that the winters in Ethans last(prenominal) must have brought about a suppression of life and spirit.Winter is also exemplary of the isolation, loneliness, and immobility that Ethan experiences. The prepare of the town, Starkfield, symbolizes the withering and isolating effects of the harsh winters on the land and the men who work the land. The name is also symbolic of the stark and carefully composed prose Wharton used to write the story. former(a) symbols include the inanimate vine on the motion porch of Fromes farmhouse that symbolizes the dead and dying spirits that lie the house and its adjacent graveyard, the farmhouse itself that has lost the L seems to be symbolic of Ethan (the house looks hopeless and lonely), it stands alone without support isolated and lonely.The image of the butterfly, which has defied the s spectre-cold and death of winter symbolizes freedom freedom that Ethan is unable to slay because he is trapped in a loveless marriage. The cushion that Ethan throws across his guinea pig is the only cushion that Zeena ever do for him. Throwing it across the floor symbolizes his growing rejection of Zeena and his impulse to run away with Mattie. Ethan thinks Matties sensory hair is one of her most beautiful features it is symbolic of her free, happy, and open p ersonality. Zeenas hair, on the other hand, is always unattractively crimped and confined with pins, just as her personality seems pinched and constrained. The symbolic use of Matties hair is more important at the climax of the novel, when it represents sweetie and love, to which Ethan is willing to give his love but cant. The symbols used by Wharton in Ethan Frome reinforce the themes of silence, isolation, and entrapment feelings that Ethan experiences in his marriage.Wharton establishes patterns of imagery by using figurative delivery language meant to be taken figuratively as well as literally. In Ethan Frome, Whartons descriptive imagery is one of the most important features of her simple and efficient prose style. Her descriptions swear out a definite stylistic and structural purpose. The figurative language used by Wharton includes metaphors and similes. Metaphorscompare two unlike things without using linguistic communication of comparison (such as like or as). For ex ample, in the beginning of the novel, Wharton gives readers the feeling of the thorniness and hardness of the winter by setting the constellation, Orion, in a sky of iron. When Ethan and Mattie enter the Frome household after move infrastructure, the kitchen has the venomous chill of a vault after the dry cold of the night. This image is distinguish to the living death that Ethan and Mattie experience in the years after their accident. Their lives do become cold and dead.The imagery associated with Zeena is bleak and cold also. When Ethan sees her before her trip to Bettsbridge, she sits in the scout light reflected from the banks of snow, which makes her face look more than usually drawn and bloodless. In contrast, the imagery associated with Mattie is associated with summer and natural life. Matties change in mood reminds Ethan of the flit of a bird in the branches and he feels that walking with her is similar to floating on a summer stream. Later in the novel, when Ethan go es at a lower place to tell Mattie that she will have to leave their house, their conversation has the effect of a woolly mullein of warning in a shady landscape. Similes, comparisons of two unlike things that use course of comparison such as like oras, are direct comparisons that Wharton uses throughout the novel.At the beginning of the novel, Ethans perception of Matties face is like a window that has caught the sunset, and later, he thinks her face seems like a wheat field under a summer breeze. As Ethan and Mattie walk home from the dance, Ethan spread abroads to Mattie that he had been hiding while she talked to Denis Eady. Wharton describes the split second when her wonder and his laughter ran together like spring rills in a thaw. The dead cucumber vine at the Frome farmhouse looks like the frizzle streamer tied to the door for a death. And, when Zeena tells Ethan that she should have sent Mattie away long ago because people were talking, the effect of her description on Ethan is like a knife-cut across the sinews. . . . As Mattie and Ethan approach their crippling accident, darkness prevails over the imagery. Darkness comes, dropping stilt like a black inter from the heavy hemlock boughs. The black overcloud causes the reader to think of a funeral. such(prenominal) figurative language evokes vivid images that reveal characterization and reinforce Whartons themes.Edith Whartons writing style is characterized by simplicity and visit. Her choice of vocabulary and sentence structure, which is as stark as the lives led by her protagonists, is deceptive. Throughout the novel, Wharton builds up patterns of imagery, patterns of behavior, and specially aerated lecture all of which serve a definite stylistic and structural purpose. star of the best examples of Whartons careful control is seen in the descriptions of the events immediately before and after the smash-up. As Mattie and Ethan ride the sled down the hill, Wharton captures the initial t hrill of the speed and thus Ethans frenzied determination to run them straight into the elm tree. Her prose slows down as she evokes Ethans return to consciousness. Not only in this example, but everywhere in the novel, her style is restrained, so that the way the words are arranged enhances their meaning without job attention to the cleverness of the arrangement.Because Wharton refrains from using unnecessary, haggard modifiers, her descriptions seem to be almost oviform or incomplete. She chooses adjectives and adverbs carefully and uses them infrequently. Her imagery is always appropriate to the limitations of her characters and is simply and subtly stated. For example, when Mattie and Ethan spend the evening together, Wharton uses the imagery of warmth and cold to complement characterization. She uses adjectives link up to warmth when describing Mattie, and adjectives related to cold to describe Zeena. Other examples of primary nature found in Whartons imagery are stars, the seasons, animals, vegetation, light, and darkness. Whartons use of structure contributes to the depiction of Ethans tragedy.The prologue and the epilogue, which take place some twenty years after the events of the main story, are create verbally in first person from The Narrators point of view. Structurally, these portions of the novel ready a frame around the story itself however, this frame is more than a decoration. The prologue not only establishes the nature of theme and action, but also begins the characterization of Zeena and Ethan Frome. It also sets the important patterns of imagery and symbolism and starts a tone of omniscient narration throughout the carcass of the novel. Ethan is the only character who is thoroughly explored. Whartons attention to minor details and her use of structure to relay Ethans manifold and tragic life story to readers enables her to demonstrate her characters as victims of the rules of society.