Overview

Often regarded as Edith Wharton's finest achievement, Ethan Frome contrasts sharply with her usual ironic contemplation of fashionable New York society. Set in the bleak winter landscape of New England farmlands, this keenly-etched portrait of the simple inhabitants of a nineteenth-century village is a masterpiece of literary realism. Ethan is a patient, rough-hewn man tormented by a passionate love for his sickly wife's young cousin, Mattie, who has come to offer her domestic services. Restricted by the bonds of marriage-however loveless it may be-and the fear of public condemnation, Ethan's desperate quest for happiness leads ultimately to pain and despair. Ethan's story, with its tragic implications of what might have been, has held irresistible fascination for readers for over a century. The tale of a decent man's fall brought on by his finest feelings is a haunting study of the human conflict between desire and duty.

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9780786160679

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An innovative insight into incompatability and, as such, something of a breakthrough. Edith Wharton was in many ways ahead of her time...In Ethan Frome she made her mark as an atypical and uncompromising psychologist. It is in many ways her most fearless novel. -- Telegraph (London) Wharton's characters leap out from the pages and...become very real. You know their hearts, souls and yearnings, and the price they pay for those yearnings. -- San Francisco Examiner Wharton's bleak New England masterpiece...[is] a compelling and haunting story. -- New York Times

Author Information

Edith Wharton (1862-1937) was born in New York and is best known for her stories of life among the upper-class society into which she was born. She was educated privately at home and in Europe. In 1894 she began writing fiction, and her novel The House of Mirth established her as a leading writer. Her novels The Age of Innocence and Old New York were each awarded the Pulitzer Prize. She was the first woman to receive that honor. In 1929 she was awarded the American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for Fiction. C. M. Hebert is an Earphones Award winner and Audie Award nominee. She is the recording studio director for the Talking Books Program at the Library of Congress' National Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. She lives in Silver Spring, Maryland, with her husband, daughter, cat, and assorted fish.

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