While others are present, there are two strong patterns in
Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome: The passage from and to the Frome
homestead and the pattern of illness that Ethan's mother begins, Zeena continues, and,
finally, Mattie assumes.
Interestingly, the narrator, who
is an engineer, hires Ethan Frome to transport him to Corbury Junction where he is sent
to troubleshoot. One day this narrator leaves one of his biochemistry books on the seat
of the wagon and Frome skims through it. However, Frome tells the narrator, "There are
things in that book that I didn't know the first word about," indicating his lost
opportunities for his own hope of becoming an engineer when he stopped his own studies
because of his mother's illness, an illness severe enough to keep Ethan in Starkfield as
a caregiver.
Zeena Pierce, an older cousin, comes to help
care for Mrs. Frome. When his mother dies, Ethan is so lonely in the winter that he
impulsively asks Zeena to marry him. Somehow, then, she becomes ill and is the second
invalid for whom Ethan must care. When Mattie Silver, a relative of Zeena's, comes to
care for Zeena, the pattern of caretakers is repeated. Then, after the failed attempt
at dual suicide, it is, ironically, Zeena who returns to the role of caretaker and
Mattie who then becomes the invalid.
Just as there is a
circular futility to the role of caretaker, so, too, is there an unending circle of
futile trips to Starkfield and other locations that terminate in the despairing return
to the Frome home. For instance, Ethan ventures out into the world to study
engineering, but must return home as caregiver; he drives the narrator to Corbury
Junction, but returns home; on several occasions he transports Mattie, but when he
considers leaving Zeena, he realizes that he cannot afford to do so, and even when he
and Mattie try to escape through death, they are returned home. Never does there seem
to be any passage out of Starkfield and the Frome homestead.
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