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The Symbolism In Ethan Frome - Online Term Paper

The Symbolism In Ethan Frome

The symbolism in the novel Ethan Frome is an aspect of the story that allows the reader to identify with the characters, their feelings, their surroundings, and the conflicts they face both in the outside world and within themselves. This tragic book tells the story of yet another forbidden pair of lovers, but separates itself from other stories such as these with its vivid imagery. The setting of the book and the characters themselves share the same traits - both sullen, silent, somewhat cold and unfriendly. Edith Wharton uses these images to portray each character, each setting, each situation with an air of the tragedy that will soon strike them.
The characters and the settings in ...

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The "L" of the farmhouse was like that of his own body, shrunken and weak (Nevius 136).
Ethan himself represented Wharton’s idea of a honorable man in the nineteenth century. He has admirable qualities, such as integrity, ambition, and wisdom (Magill 531). It is his sense of morals and responsibility that continuously prevents him from leaving Zeena and joining Mattie to a better life for himself (Nevius 132). He is trapped not only by his morality here, but has been a trapped man from the very beginning. His parents’ illness, his unfinished education, the farm and saw-mill he is left with, and finally his marriage to the once bright Zeena all bring Ethan further into a state of unhappiness (Ousby 154).
Wharton was also careful to bring out Ethan’s quality of sensitivity to the beauty around him (Nevius 153), a quality seemingly unique to him until he meets Mattie Silver. Both Ethan and Mattie are humans "whose souls - and finally, whose bodies - are crushed by meaningless but ...

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PAPER DETAILS

Added: 8/4/2007 12:00:38 PM
Category: Book Reports
Type: Free Paper
Words: 537
Pages: 2

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