The theme of a sense of non-belonging of intellectuals in a rural setting is unfolded in the main characters of Edith Wharton’s novel Ethan Frome and Flannery O’Connor’s short story Good Country People. Both novels portray people with educational and intellectual aspirations who have been challenged by life circumstances and could not fulfill their dreams. This paper argues that Ethan and Joy represent intelligent individuals unable to be happy among rural people due to differences in worldviews and values.
The main characters in Ethan Frome and Good Country People are intellectuals with failed educational or intellectual careers plans. Ethan Frome had always “wanted to be an engineer and to live in towns, where there were lectures and big libraries” (Wharton 41). Similarly, Joy wanted to live in a town and continue her philosophy career. However, the difference between the two characters’ failed intellectual ambitions is in the reason why they stayed in the country. Indeed, for Joy, she “had made it plain that if it had not been for this condition, she would be far from these red hills and good country people” (O’Connor 5). On the other hand, Ethan did not go to live in town because of his moral obligation to his family.
Living in rural areas, both characters are exposed to conflicts with other people due to their otherness. Her community and family do not support Joy’s intellectual aspirations because they attribute her to some complexity of character. Indeed, Joy’s mother “could not help but feel that it would have been better if the child had not taken the Ph.D.” (O’Connor 5). Similarly, Ethan Frome did not belong to the rural surroundings because his ultimate aspiration was to pursue his engineering occupation in the city and continue his educational career. He is different from his wife, Zeena, who represents rurality because he seeks development, and she does not want to live in a place that dominates her. Indeed, “in the greater cities which attracted Ethan, she would have suffered a complete loss of identity” (Wharton 41). Overall, from the first pages of the novel, Ethan is perceived as an alien in the village due to his intellectuality, which resembles his similarity with Joy.
Since Joy obtained a Ph.D., it induced conflict with the people around her since they failed to relate to her profession. It was not appropriate to say, “my daughter is a philosopher” (O’Connor 5) within rural values. In a rural community, people are thought to be “good” if they “do not want to go to college” but are willing to “devote [their] life to Christian service” like the Bible salesman (O’Connor 8). Since Joy is the complete opposite of such rural ideals, with a degree in philosophy and an atheist worldview, she does not have a sense of belonging to rurality.
Both characters conflict with the rurality they live in. Ethan is “unhappy” in the “oppressive reality” where his sensitivity and open-minded worldview contradict the expected conformity to the rural way of living (Wharton 20-22). Similarly, the rurality is despised by Joy due to the persistence of gossiping, shallow conversations, and mediocre worldviews “good country people” shared. On the contrary to them, Joy values sincerity and openness, which is validated by her choice of an “ugly” name (O’Connor 4). She selected the name Hulga instead of Joy based on “its ugly sound and then the full genius of its fitness” to her identity regardless of the dislikes of others (O’Connor 4). Likewise, Ethan engages in adultery to follow his desires despite the community’s disapproval and criticism.
In conclusion, the comparison of the novel and the short story unveils the similarity of Ethan’s and Joy’s intellectualism as the source of their unhappiness in and exclusion from the rural community. Although they had different reasons for abandoning their intellectual aspirations, they suffered from circumstances that limited their opportunity for growth. Thus, Flannery O’Connor and Edith Wharton conveyed the complexity of the theme of not belonging through the perspective of a mismatch between one’s intellectual potential and the means of expressing it.
Works Cited
O’Connor, Flannery. Good Country People, 1955, Web.
Wharton, Edith. Ethan Frome. EMC/Paradigm Publishing, 1998.