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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A love story as bitter as the New England winter,
By flame (Tennessee) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome (Barron's Book Notes) (Paperback)
Inside a bare Massachussetts farmhouse a century ago, a man and two women sit down to dinner. Observing the unhappy trio is a traveler, forced to take shelter with the strange family because of the blizzard that rages outside. Of the three, one is proud, stoic, and hard-bitten; one is shrewish and whiny, and one works silently at the tasks that must be done -- stoking the fire, setting the table for dinner. What brought these three to their present state, and what holds them here in this living hell? This book is an incisive character study with an unexpected ending. The portrayal of the three in the final chapter left me with chills.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
We shall never again be alone like this,
This review is from: Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome (Paperback)
Edith Wharton filled her novels with a feeling of ruin, passion and restriction. People can fall in love, but rarely do things turn out well.
But but few of even her books can evoke the feeling of "Ethan Frome," whick packs plenty of emotion, vibrancy and regrets into a short novella. While the claustrophobic feeling doesn't suit her writing well, she still spins a beautiful, horrifying story of a man facing a life without hope or joy. It begins nearly a quarter of a century after the events of the novel, with an unnamed narrator watching middle-aged, crippled Ethan Frome drag himself to the post-office. He becomes interested in Frome's tragic past, and hears out his story. Ethan Frome once hoped to live an urban, educated life, but ended up trapped in a bleak New England town with a hypochondriac wife, Zeena, whom he didn't love. But then his wife's cousin Mattie arrives, a bright young girl who understands Ethan far better than his wife ever tried to. Unsurprisingly, he begins to fall in love with her, but still feels an obligation to his wife. But then Zeena threatens to send Mattie away and hire a new housekeeper, threatening the one bright spot in Ethan's dour life. Now Ethan must either rebel against the morals and strictures of his small village, or live out his life lonely. But when he and Mattie try for a third option, their affair ends in tragedy. Wharton was always at her best when she wrote about society's strictures, morals, and love that defies that. But rather than the opulent backdrop of wealthy New York, here the setting is a bleak, snowy New England town, appropriately named Starkfield. It's a good reflection of Ethan Frome's life, and a good illustration of how the poor can be trapped. Even when she describes a "ruin of a man" in a cold, distant town, Wharton spins beautiful prose ("the night was so transparent that the white house-fronts between the elms looked gray against the snow") and eloquent symbolism, like the shattered pickle dish. There's only minimal dialogue -- most of what the characters think and feel is kept inside. Instead she piles on the atmosphere, and increases the tension between the three main characters, as attraction and responsibility pull Ethan in two directions. It all finally climaxes in the disaster hinted at in the first chapter, which is as beautifully written and wistful as it is tragic. If the book has a flaw, it's the incredibly small cast -- mainly just the main love triangle. Ethan's not a strong or decisive man, but his desperation and loneliness are absolutely heartbreaking, as well as his final fate. Mattie seems more like a symbol of the life he wants that a full-fledged person, and Zeena is annoying and whiny up until the end, when we see a different side of her personality. Not a stereotypical shrew. "Ethan Frome" is a true tragedy -- as beautifully written as it is, it's still Wharton's description of how a man merely survives instead of living, hopeless and devastated.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Not what it seems,
By A Customer
This review is from: Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome (Barron's Book Notes) (Paperback)
I thought that this book was a great book. Instead of just telling the plot, Edith Wharton used a lot of symbolism to tell the story and show the characters emotions, because the point of view is that of an objective bystander. It isn't a very good book if you just want to read for plot, but if you want to read something a little deeper, it's a very interesting book.
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