An Eco-feminist Analysis Of Ethan Frome

The concept of eco-feminism was first put forward by French feminist Francoise d’Eaubonne (1920-2005) in her book Le Feminisme ou La Mort published in1974. This term refers to the interlinks between feminist issues and ecological problems. From then on, eco-feminism has become a forceful cultural thought and exerted growing influence hence after. In the recent30years, researches on eco-feminism are booming and the United Sates is on the frontier. Scholars from various domains have joined in the study of eco-feminism. Many philosophers, historians, sociologists, anthropologists, biologists, environmentalists and physical scientists turn to be the key figures of eco-feminism. They have interpreted eco-feminism from their respective research fields and published a great deal of theses and treatises. Representatives from the America are Karen J. Warren、Carolyn Merchant and Patrick D. Murphy; Val Plumwood and Ariel Salleh are representative figures from Australia; In India, the most representative scholar is Vandana Shiva.Ethan Frome, published in1911, has been regarded as one of the best tragic novels by Edith Wharton. This novel is a complicated love story among three characters:Ethan, his wife Zeena and his cousin Mattie. It well presents Edith Wharton’s changing of writing style. For the first time in this novel, she has tried to convert her writing angle from the "old new York upper class" to the "countryside of new England"Eco-feminist criticism aims to read and interpret literary text by the aid of eco-feminist theories and practices. Adopting the eco-feminist perspective, we can find new elements which have been ignored before in a piece of literary work; we can probe into the relations and differences among different roles----man and nature, culture and nature, different races, classes and genders. In addition, we can adopt eco-feminism to re-read the classic works or the works created by male writers.This thesis is to interpret Ethan Frome, one of Edith Wharton"s most famous tragic novels, from the perspective of eco-feminism. This paper aims to discuss the following two questions:1. In Ethan Frome, how does the writer depict the man and nature, female and male relations? Does the depiction reveal Edith Wharton’s eco-feminist view?2. Have the three eco-feminist textual features:strong consciousness of "place", plain and direct language, first person narration, been reflected in Ethan Frome and how?In order to answer those two questions, I follow such a research procedure:firstly, starting from the eco-feminist research perspective, I choose some examples from the text and see how the author has depicted those two relations. Secondly, proceeding from the textual structure, I find out the three eco-fenniest textual features implied in the text.The Following are the major findings of this research:1. In Ethan Frome, the relation between man and nature is that of interdependence and harmonious coexistence; the relation between male and female is that of equality, liberty and fraternity. Such depictions reveal author’s eco-feminist view.2. In Ethan Frome, the three eco-feminist textual features are fully reflected. Thus this novel can be viewed and interpreted as an eco-feminist literary text.3. The re-reading and re-interpretation of classic works can help dig out unexpected parts of the works and enrich the literary works. Meanwhile, we can learn from eco-feminism while dealing with the practical social and economical problems.