I wouldn't have met Piti if it hadn't been for a chichigua. To translate chichigua as a kite does not do justice to these beautiful creations of...
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Tragic story of wasted lives, set against a bleak New England background. A poverty-stricken New England farmer, his ailing wife and a youthful housekeeper are drawn relentlessly into a deep-rooted domestic struggle in this hauntingly grim tale of thwarted love. Considered by many to be Wharton's masterpiece.
Synopsis:
Classic story of wasted lives, set against a bleak New England background. Superbly delineated characters in a hauntingly grim tale of thwarted love. Considered by many to be Wharton's masterpiece.
megcampbell3, December 23, 2007 (view all comments by megcampbell3)
It has been said that this story, about two people who fall in love—a married man with his ailing wife's cousin—is about wasted lives—but isn't it true that we can only make decisions in the present, we can only want, need, and be effected by what moves us in the present? This is a tale of two people whose present lives cannot allow them a bliss-filled future together without causing pain to another; so they choose to bear this pain themselves in a failed double-suicide attempt that is supposed to end it all. As fortune would hold, they both go on to live in the same small house with broken bodies and broken spirits, the formerly ailing wife now in the part of nursemaid. "Ethan Frome" is considered by many to be Edith Wharton's masterpiece, and I'd agree. It is one of the supreme masterpieces of all of literature—wearing unassuming clothing. I did not, however, agree with the commonly ascribed adjectives that this story is grim, bleak, or depressing—instead, I found it haunting; a flawless portrait of our deepest interiors.
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Classic story of wasted lives, set against a bleak New England background. Superbly delineated characters in a hauntingly grim tale of thwarted love. Considered by many to be Wharton's masterpiece.
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