Student Question

In Ethan Frome, how did Ethan feel the morning after his evening alone with Mattie?

Quick answer:

The morning after his evening alone with Mattie, Ethan feels irrationally happy and joyful despite not having physically touched her. He experiences a "vision" of a life with Mattie, filled with marital happiness, and believes she understands his restraint. However, this happiness is tempered by the awareness that his wife, Zeena, will return that day, ending his brief escape into this imagined future with Mattie.

Expert Answers

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Having spent a night together with Mattie without the troubling presence of Zeena in Chapter Five, Ethan wakes up the next morning in Chapter Six with a feeling of happiness and joy. Although, as he reflected at the end of Chapter Five that he had not even touched Mattie's hand, as he had desired, still he had greatly enjoyed his evening and the intimacy that they shared. Note what we are told at the beginning of Chapter Six:

He did not know why he was so irrationally happy, for nothing was changed in his life or hers. He had not even touched the tip of his fingers or looked her full in the eyes. But their evening together had given him a vision of what life at her side might be, and he was glad now that he had done nothing to trouble the sweetness of the picture. He had a fancy that she knew what had restrained him.

This quote therefore tells us that Ethan was so happy because he had had a "vision" of what their life together could be like, sitting together in marital happiness. He also feels that Mattie knows what was going through his mind and shares the same desires. However, at the back of Ethan's mind is always the knowledge that this is but a temporary state of affairs and that his wife is due back that day, which will put to one side his imaginative flirtations with the idea of living with Mattie permanently.

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