Monday, June 23, 2008

Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome


Hello fellow book friends!! I know I haven't posted in forever, but I have been reading. I have been reading the No. 1 Ladies Detective agency series and recently finished "Ethan Frome" by Edith Wharton. Today I am going to talk a little bit about "Ethan Frome." First let's find out about the author. Edith Wharton was born in 1865, into a wealthy New York family. She traveled extensively and was the first woman to receive the Pulitzer Prize for literature for her novel "Age of Innocence" (on my to reading list). She spent her life writing, promoting French imperialism and participating in charitable works. She died in 1937, in France.
Wharton wrote "Ethan Frome" in 1912. Ethan Frome is the name of a man who lives in Starkfield, a small New England town. He desperately longs to leave this town but his trapped there taking care of his sick parents and his invalid wife, Zeena. He pines after Mattie, his cousin, and contemplates leaving his wife to start a new life with Mattie but tragedy prevents this from occuring.
The vivid descriptive narratives draws the reader into Ethan's gloomy and seemingly hopeless life. The entire tale is told by an unknown narrator who peers into Ethan's life from the outside. Although this was a dismal and at times depressing story it is considered an American classic. In 1933, it was made into a movie...that I'll have to check out one of these days!
In the upcoming days I am going to post some of my summer reading suggestions for the beach and those dog days of summer!

3 comments:

Rachel and Tyler said...

did you like it? I can't say I did.

Sarah said...

It was very sad and depressing. I loved the descriptions in the book, but I wasn't a huge fan. It was certainly a tragedy.

Paula Belli said...

I read this book in high school and again as an adult. I had to buy my own copy so that I could read it whenever I want to. It catches the human feelings of people.