The Narrator Of Ethan Frome Written In 1911 By Edith Wharton

The Narrator of Ethan Frome
Ethan Frome is a popular novel written in 1911 by Edith Wharton. The plot of the novel consists of an unnamed narrator who tells the tragic tale of a poor farmer in the New England area. Ethan Frome is married to a cranky old lady but falls in love with his wife’s cousin who helps out around the house. In the climax of the story the two in love attempt suicide to free themselves from Zeena’s control, but end up handicapped for the rest of their life. Even though he isn’t the protagonist of the story the character that needs to be analyzed is the narrator. The narrator is the main character of the novel because he is the one who retells the story with his interpretations. The tale of Ethan Frome and his love for

This way of thinking is the wrong way to analyze the novel. The novel Ethan Frome needs to be analyzed through the eyes of the unnamed narrator that starts the novel. In the beginning of the novel, the reader learns about who the narrator is but we learn of the events as he lives temporarily in Starkfield. He becomes interested in Ethan and eventually pays Ethan to drive him to work. On a severe winter night, the narrator is forced to stay the Frome’s house and says “It was that night that I found the clue to Ethan Frome, and began to put together this vision of his story………” (Wharton 12). This quote shows that the following story of Ethan Frome is being

There are a multitude of concepts that we can learn the narrator’s stance on including occupation, residency, and emotions. We learn in the beginning of the story that the narrator is an engineer that is working on a nearby electrical plant. We also learn from the narrator’s questions that Ethan went to school in Florida for engineering also until he had to come back because of his families’ sickness. This is one of the multiple similarities between Ethan and the narrator. It also shows one of the numerous ways that the narrator learned from the life of Ethan. Ethan’s dream was to leave the farm and engineering would be his best opportunity to do so. The narrator having seen the dismay of Ethan’s dream would feel the importance to works harder in his own life. Another comparison between the characters is the residency in Starkfield. Ethan has been there for most of his life while the narrator was there for one winter. That doesn’t seem very similar but it was Ethan’s dream to sell the farm and move away. Wharton writes of Ethan’s dream in her novel as the two were talking about their trips to Florida: “I was there once, and for a good while afterward I could call up the sight of it in winter. But now it’s all snowed over” (8). With the realization of Ethan’s dreams and the similarity of his own situation of being marooned for a month, allows only the narrator to understand and