The isolation of each .

             character before the tragedy is not self-imposed, but is enforced .

             upon them by outside circumstances. Ethan tried to escape the .

             isolation of Starkfield and his father"s farm by going off to college .

             at Worcester. Then his father"s death brought him back to the farm.

             There are several significant phrases within the body of this novel that would signify the silence and isolation that these three .

             characters live in, including: "A dead cucumber-vine dangles from .

             the porch like the crape streamer tied to the door for a death.". .

             (Wharton, 51) In this particular phrase, the narrator has portrayed .

             Ethan looking for a way out of his marriage and isolated life, by .

             imagining his wife"s possible death, without him having to make the .

             choice. The narrator refers to "hemlock-shaded lane, where Ethan"s .

             sawmill glommed through the night and out again into the comparative .

             clearness of the fields" (Wharton, 48), in this paragraph alone, I get an imagery of death and loneliness without any hope for tomorrow. .

             Even Ethan"s farmhouse was symbolic of himself. The "L" of the farmhouse was like that of his own body, shrunken and weak (Nevius, 136). Ethan himself represented Wharton"s idea of an honorable man in the nineteenth century. He has admirable qualities, such as integrity, ambition, and wisdom (Trilling, 531). It is his sense of morals and responsibility that continuously prevents him from leaving Zeena and joining Mattie to make a better life for himself. He is trapped not only by his morality here, but has .

             been a trapped man from the very beginning. His parents" illness, his unfinished education, the farm and saw-mill he is left with, and finally his marriage to the once bright Zeena all bring Ethan further into a state of unhappiness (Kellogg, 154). This story ends in tragedy for all three and the reader is left with a feeling of remorse for each character.