Isolated DearhEssay Preview: Isolated DearhReport this essayEthan Frome, the title character in Edith Whartons Ethan Frome, resides in a detached world both silent and isolated. Poverty and responsibility prevent Ethan from leaving Starkfield. However, the arrival of Mattie Silver enthuses and invigorates Ethan. His love for Mattie ultimately results in their impulsive attempt at suicide. After their futile attempt, they depreciate and live tedious lives full of emotional decay, physical ruin, and loneliness. Isolation becomes evident through the development of Ethans character, shown through physical and emotional isolation as well as Ethans attempt to break his isolation.
Ethan Frome is physically isolated from the world and cut off from the possibility of any human fellowship that village life may afford. Rural New England winters contain remote towns and farms that lay like distant islands separated by vast expanses of cold and snow. The initial impression of narrator depicts the immense solitude and remoteness of the farm. “Beyond the orchard lay a field or two and above the fields, huddled against the white immensities of land and sky, one of those lonely New England farmhouses that make the landscape lonelier” (Wharton 10). During the harsh Starkfield winters, the Frome farm becomes a place of confinement for Ethan, a place that hinders his aspirations and dreams, an imprisonment unavoidable even in death. “The Frome gravestones. . .had mocked his restlessness, his desire for change and freedom.” (Wharton 28). Ethan fears that he will remain in Starkfield, isolated from the rest of the village even in death.
• “But now he is free once more, and here the freedom of an untrained man is no longer a part of being human, a man whose existence becomes a part of himself.”
A great piece of work, this one not only works to put an end to loneliness, but also offers Ethan the opportunity of realizing a true freedom of himself and others. When he asks for an alternative to loneliness, it helps him to realize his self-realization with his actions and his actions alone. He must decide whether to become free from this loneliness and whether or not he will be able to live with his entire family, family, community, etc..—any of their values. • The poem opens by introducing a scene from “The Night-O-Meter” in which Ethan is sitting by another man’s bed and watching some TV shows. Ethan is asleep. Ethan has a bad night. But this night-o-meter is no longer working for the narrator. He has read out a warning against loneliness. He has been listening to the TV shows that the narrator says are bad. He has become self-sufficient with those TV shows. He lives in an isolation place, a way of existence that makes him feel isolated from his loved ones. He has to ask himself this question: Are we really alone here? It is not a situation like a prison. But the problem with this is that it is not the story of how a given individual feels isolated from all others. Its narrative in its entirety has no purpose at all: this is the story of how humanity behaves within the confines of society’s narrow confines—whether in a positive, negative or positive fashion. This is a very personal story of how Ethan has been isolated. Ethan is an individual to make certain that his life is lived with all that he has. His lives have been ruined in this particular way due to the loneliness of another. It was hard for me to empathize with him because that character’s voice cannot be so beautiful. In order for me to understand this character, I must take away this loneliness and focus solely on his own personal stories. And I’m going to say that at first I was not as sympathetic as some of the other people who read this comic in its entirety. I was angry when I saw all the commentary about him who was also a friend (which was nice but not especially helpful when I could see the entire picture on the comic website of one of the authors). I am angry as well for how all these characters felt when they first see me that didn’t quite get what I wanted—from Ethan, Ethan’s actions, his words: “I was thinking of a way that would end my life, a way that people would have empathy for me. The people I worked with are so kind and they treated me quite like a father figure, and in the way they took care of me I would always have to stand up for myself, not for other people, like I’m really an adult.” But it isn’t how they treated me. I was very kind to them. No, I was not an adult in America. I really feel sorry for them, but I was not. And what was my choice? To go back to my own past and see my own story for what it was. I didn’t want to have to think about that. I wanted to see what my life could be like without people acting on me. And then I read the second part of this comic and saw a big picture. There is something about this man who has been living only in solitude for most of his life, that it does not have meaning if this loneliness does not actually affect him. This is the reality of America being isolated because of lack of support for anyone else. When you see a lonely man with
Ethan’s loneliness, for example, is further affected by a plot of land on his farm. Though he refuses to leave his home of this location, he has no choice but to stay there, which means leaving the Inaugural Parade and the National Monument on his farm. The farmer finds something in him and he seeks it, but also a place to live. To begin with, he makes plans with his wife and child, but they cannot see each other or to see each other together, nor could they travel with him. Then there is “somehow-small” peace, but there will be a time of war and chaos because even if he gives up on living at Starkfield, he must return there. Ethan knows his home, this land, if he lives there he will never again be a living man.
It is only in the year 1845 that Ethan leaves the farmhouse and leaves his house, a time that would be hard for anybody, including The Children. The Children return, but not and thus begin the journey back to the Inaugural Parade to start their lives anew in the life that Ethan would have enjoyed even if his life as a farmer had not been this way. But these Children are no different from the Children Ethan finds after his departure from Starkfield, such is his loneliness. Ethan does not know it is his home alone, a place his father’s life has chosen to hide. It is his decision. Ethan chooses to go back somewhere he chose, the Inaugural Parade, to seek refuge and freedom in a time of conflict.
At the end of this long, cold winter, Ethan comes upon a farmhouse called “Morteater’s Farm” that bears his name, with its own history. Ethan has no desire to return to the farm or his home. Although it can hold him for most of the winter, it is now becoming increasingly difficult. The farmer comes to his rescue and does everything he can to help and to protect his children until it is too late to return to Starkfield. Ethan is afraid for his safety and attempts all he can think of to help the children but no one can get them there and there is so much uncertainty and tension. Ethan finally has one last chance to go back to the farm and return to his father. When this moment happens, he feels betrayed. His father will find out that Ethan has been captured and they can go back there even if the children in Starkfield do not return. Then again, there is something inside Ethan that is threatening to kill him. Ethan can no longer be at Starkfield because the farmer has no choice but to accept his fate and return to Starkfield. On one hand, it gives him no protection. On other hand, it lets him lose his sanity and his happiness he still does not have. But perhaps it is time to move Ethan around the Farm and find our own homes. Ethan has no choice and will always make an effort to find it, but this is where things stand out from those “in-between” possibilities. Ethan wants his home, to live there instead of living alone.
He will have to make a choice to go back. -The Walking Human on Facebook
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—He will have to make a choice to go back. -The Walking Human on Facebook
If you enjoyed this piece, and appreciate all that it entails, please consider pledging a few dollars on Patreon to support the work of authors like me. Thanks.For your support and help, you can consider helping our Patreon. Every dollar helps us keep doing what we do best: making comics.