Ethan Frome

Plot

An unnamed male narrator spending a winter in Starkfield, Massachusetts spots a limping, quiet man around the village. This is Ethan Frome, a lifelong resident and a local fixture of the community. The narrator learns that Frome's limp arose from having been injured in an accident. The narrator hires Frome as his driver and the story flashes back 24 years to detail Frome's past.

Previously, Frome was married to a sickly woman named Zeena (Zenobia), who became jealous when Frome fell in love with her cousin Mattie. Zeena plans to send Mattie away and has already hired another girl to replace her, claiming that she needs someone more efficient because her health is failing more rapidly than ever. Ethan, miserable at the thought of losing Mattie, considers running away with her, but he lacks the money to do so.

The next morning, Ethan rushes into town to try to get a cash advance from a customer for a load of lumber in order to have the money with which to abscond with Mattie. His plan is unhinged by guilt, however, when his customer's wife expresses compassion for Ethan. He realizes that he cannot cheat this kindly woman and her husband out of money.

Ethan comes back to the farm and picks up Mattie to take her to the train station. They stop at a hill upon which they had once planned to go sledding and decide to sled together as a way of delaying their sad parting. After their first run, Mattie suggests a suicide pact: that they go down again, and steer the sled directly into a tree, so they will never be parted and so that they may spend their last moments together. The resulting crash leaves both of them alive, Ethan with a permanent limp and Mattie paralyzed.

The narrative returns to the present, where it is revealed that Mattie now lives with the Fromes with Zeena as her caregiver. Ironically, Ethan and Mattie have gotten their wish to stay together, but in mutual unhappiness and discontent, with Mattie helpless, and Zeena as a constant presence between the two of them.


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