NOTE: Free essay sample provided on this page should be used for references or sample purposes only. The sample essay is available to anyone, so any direct quoting without mentioning the source will be considered plagiarism by schools, colleges and universities that use plagiarism detection software. To get a completely brand-new, plagiarism-free essay, please use our essay writing service.
One click instant price quote
In the introduction of Ethan Frome, the narrator finds himself in Starkfield, Massachusetts for the winter due to a carpenters strike. During this time, he learns the story of Ethan Frome through various people in the town. His first impression of Frome is that he is a quiet and unapproachable man just by encountering him at the post office. When the stable horses fall ill to an epidemic in the town, the narrator is left without a way to the train station each day for his work, a local man, Harmon Gow, to speak to Frome about getting a ride to and from work. For one week Frome takes the narrator back and forth without even speaking. Then one day when his train is delayed Frome decides to take the narrator all the way there, upon passing Frome farm he hesitantly speaks about changed family fortune.
Finally, during a real bad snowstorm the horses have a hard time keeping to the road so once they saw Frome's gate they decide that the narrator should stay the night at his farm. As they enter the house and as Frome speaks you hear a womens voice. This is all that happens in the introduction. In chapter 1, Ethan Frome finds himself stand in front of a church at midnight. He walks around the church so he can look in the basement window to look at the festivities going on. When he looks in to see the dance seems to be coming to a close.
But when the young, handsome, and energetic Denis Eady jumps back onto the dance floor and claps his hands, the musicians take up their instruments and the dance hall again fills with life. Ethan focuses his attention on Mattie Silver, a girl wearing a cherry- colored scarf and dancing with Eady. She is cousin to Ethan's wife, Zeena, and has been living with the Frome's as a housekeeper for over a year. Ethan, who has come to walk Mattie home from the dance, has become quite attached to her in the course of the year, finding kinship with her in their mutual appreciation of nature. As he watches her whirling effortlessly among the pulsating crowd, he wonders why he had ever dreamed that the feelings of attraction might be mutual. It seems to him that her free and easy movement between partners indicates her indifference toward him.
In chapter 2 as the dance ends, Ethan first hears and then sees Mattie emerge, but he shrinks back into the shadows to avoid initiating contact. The crowd thins out rapidly, and Mattie is left wondering what has kept Ethan from coming to meet her. As she stands alone, Eady approaches and offers to take her for a ride in his father's cutter (a small, light sleigh, drawn by a horse). Ethan, still hanging back, observes Mattie seeming to waver, and wonders whether she will go with Eady or refuse his attentions. After unhitching the horse from its post and setting the cutter in motion, Eady confidently calls out to Mattie to hop in.
She politely declines. When Eady attempts to pick her up by linking arms with her, she draws away gracefully. As Frome listens to the bells of the cutter fade away into the distance, he sees Mattie's shadow walking alone up the hill toward the silent snow bank. Ethan quickly closes in on Mattie, surprising her with his presence when he catches up to her amidst the Varnums's price trees.
She is genuinely caught off guard by his trick and lets out a peal of laughter that thrills Ethan. They link arms together and look at the "coasting hill, " where people go sledding. Ethan says that they can sled there the following night, assuming that the moon is out. Mattie mentions that Ned Hale and Ruth Vacuum, a young engaged couple, nearly collided with the big elm at the bottom of the hill when they were sledding. "We were all sure they were killed, " she says with a shudder. Beginning the hike home, Ethan continues to wonder about Mattie's feelings toward Eady and decides to press the issue by needling Mattie about her behavior at the dance. But his roundabout fashion of pursuing the conversation only leads Mattie to believe that Ethan's wife, Zeena, is on the verge of dismissing her.
Mattie wonders if Ethan himself is similarly inclined, although dismissal of Mattie is the furthest thing from Ethan's mind. Left at an impasse, the couple drops the subject wordlessly, and Ethan and Mattie continue on their way. At the Frome gate, Ethan attempts to reassure Mattie, and the companions then draw together as they ascend the hill. Ethan, meditating on the prospect of being with Mattie always, puts his arm decidedly around her for the first time. At the back door of the dark house, Ethan searches for the key that Zeena usually leaves out for them, but finds nothing. When Ethan kneels down for a more thorough search, he spies a faint ray of light behind the door.
The door then opens to reveal Zeena, a sickly, complaining woman. Zeena explains that she was unable to sleep on account of her poor health, and she brings her lamp around to the stairs to light the way up. Ethan declares that he will be staying downstairs for a while, as he has some accounts to review. When Zeena dismisses the idea as a foolish one, he submissively follows her and Mattie upstairs, retiring into the bedroom with his wife. In chapter 3, its the morning after the dance, Ethan heads out early to the wood lot to attend to some hauling. He and Zeena have not exchanged a single word since retiring the previous night, during which Ethan lay awake for many hours, preoccupied by his thoughts of Mattie.
As he hauls the wood, Ethan regrets that he didn't kiss Mattie when they were alone together the night before. Ethan's mind then turns to the relationship between Mattie and Zeena, which has been chilly ever since Mattie came to live in Starkfield, after her father died. A sense of dread and foreboding fills Ethan, and he channels his fear by throwing himself into his work until mid-day. He considers driving his lumber load into the village at once, but then thinks better of it and returns to the house to check on the women. Coming in, he is surprised to see Zeena sitting at the table in her best dress, with a small piece of luggage at her side. She says that she cannot stand h...
Free research essays on topics related to: wife zeena, mattie, ethan, frome, ethan frome
Research essay sample on Ethan Frome Wife Zeena
