“Ethan Frome” is a novel published in 1911 by the Pulitzer Prize-winning American author Edith Wharton. It is set in the fictitious town of Starkfield, Massachusetts and tells the story of a man with a history of thwarted dreams and desires, who is trapped in an unhappy marriage. He has to decide if he is willing to succumb to the life he is leading, which makes him miserable, or seek his own happiness without caring about the consequences of this decision. Edith Wharton, born Edith Newbold Jones;
inhabitants and the continuous wintry imagery becomes both “overwhelming and oppressive” Zeena, initially lively, became increasingly lost to hypochondria and bouts of silence. The effect is to gradually make the reader feel just as oppressed as the main characters in the novel, we too have “been in Starkfield too many winters.” While Plath’s poetry is arguably a dark embodiment of America as the home and great power symbolic of America’s fight for independence which reflects her rejection of Patriarchy and
polite veneer’ . This is evident in the titular quote - a message from Plath to her mother, Aurelia - which shows her ability to be honest about society’s ignorance towards the ‘hardest things’, even to her own family. Gilman, a feminist writer, uses characters in her often satirical short stories to highlight the experiences of a woman living in an overwhelmingly patriarchal society. Her most famous story, The Yellow Wallpaper records her ‘narrow escape’ from ‘complete mental ruin’ , and, along with her