Guest Blogger - Christian C.

Since we have just finished reading Ethan Frome, I have decided to address a few topics that we were meant to base our reading notes on.

One topic that we discussed thoroughly in class was the importance of setting and its relation to the characters of the book. These conversations were directed towards the correlation between the out-dated, isolated town of Starkfield and Ethan. Another place related to Ethan that we didn’t touch on is the “small room behind the untenanted ‘best parlour’” where he often takes refuge from his dissatisfying life. This place is described in the first paragraph of chapter eight:
“Here he had nailed up shelves for his books, built himself a box-sofa out of boards and a mattress, laid out his papers on a kitchen-table, hung on the rough plaster wall an engraving of Abraham Lincoln and a calendar with ‘Thoughts from the Poets,’ and tried, with these meagre properties, to produce some likeness to the study of a ‘minister’ who had been kind to him and lent him books when he was at Worcester.”
The isolation and bareness of the room is representative of Ethan. However, Zeena is also affected by her setting in the novel. She reflects the run-down, invaluable home which she is usually contained to. In the prologue the Frome residence is described
“…in all its plaintive ugliness. The black wraith of deciduous creeper flapped from the porch, and the thin wooden walls, under their worn coat of paint, seemed to shiver in the wind…”

We also talked about the significance of the color red in class, but I’d like to mention a couple references that were not brought up. One of these is the fact that the pickle dish which Mattie (or “the cat”) breaks while Zeena is away. Mattie embraces the use of said dish while Zeena tucks it away on a high, safe shelf. Mattie’s use of the red plate magnifies the contrast between her and Zeena thus making her more appealing to Ethan. Another noteworthy inclusion of the color red can be found in chapter nine when Ethan is supposed to be taking Mattie to the Flats (when in reality they’re on the tour of fond memories building up to their attempted tag-team suicide):
“As they drove away the sun sank behind the hill and the pine-boles turned from red to grey. By a devious track between the fields they wound back to the Starkfield road. Under the open sky they light was still clear, with a reflection of cold red on the eastern hills.”
The color is being drained from Starkfield with Mattie’s departure. Throughout the novel, Edith Wharton uses imagery and symbolism to convey thoughts, feelings, personalities, and meanings that cannot be revealed through the unique, retelling-of-a-story point of view.