So many parts about Ethan Frome made this story one of the most depressing that we’ve read all semester. I think it’s especially the bleak life of these farms the sets up for all of their misery. Ethan Frome’s marriage to Zenna because he was lonely was of course the first incident of foreshadowed misery. Just this miserable marriage is depressing enough. To further depress the situation is falling in love with another women—who lives in the house with you and your wife!!! This is depressing not only to Ethan Frome (though he doesn’t realize it then) but also the other woman, who falls for a man who is already legally bound to someone else, and finally it is probably the most depressing for Zenna, who though pretends to be ignorant of the situation for most of the book would have to have been blind to not realize the man that she was married o was in love with the family member that she invited to live with them. Despite Zenna’s lack of likeability I cannot help but feel for the woman who has to live with this. Of course since we never know what she is thinking and because it’s hard to understand her twisted motives in the end I can’t feel as much sympathy as I did prior to the wreck.
The misery and depression of the story reaches the peak with the ‘accident ‘ on the sled. It’s unimaginable to live with your wife and the woman who survived the injuries you cause, while everyone in the house knows why they were in an ‘accident’: Ethan’s affection for this other woman. Being stuck in this house to me seems equivalent to hell for eternity, because there is no escaping the misery that is inevitable for those three people whose lives are only half way through. There has to be so much pain in the sight of each other everyday.
I have to agree on the conjecture of hell< but who is to blame for the situation?
ReplyDeleteYour post made me wonder this: at what point did Ethan lose his love for Mattie due to her complaining, if he ever did?
ReplyDeleteAshina, I agree that the situation of the three of them living in the house is miserable. However, do we know that all three of them are aware of the reason behind the accident? Mattie and Ethan, of course, know, but does Zeena know? She might suspect that Ethan and Mattie stopped to sled because of their feelings for each other, but she does not know for sure. And, unless if Ethan or Mattie told her, which seems doubtful, she does not know that they were trying to kill themselves.
ReplyDeleteJessica, you make a good point about this. Zeena might know, and she might not know; she might have guessed and have kept silent just to torture the two of them. As Mrs. Hale says, "Nobody knows Zeena's thoughts."
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