The Theme of Coldness in Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome Wallace Stevens' "The Snow Man."

Coldness is a prominent theme in both Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome and Wallace Stevens' "The Snow Man." When one thinks of coldness, the misery, the emptiness, and the lack of life associated with it also come to mind. Ethan Frome and "The Snowman" show that the coldness of one's surroundings turns one cold and numb on the inside by taking away all feeling and imagination and leaves a person with nothing. Ethan Frome is the …

…that is." (Lines 13 - 16). The speaker is forever trapped in "the same bare place" (Line 12). The environment changes people, especially cold areas. The "frost and the boughs... [and the] misery in the sound of the wind" start to take over and replace all that is represents life inside. (Lines 2,8) Coldness slowly creeps over a person and consumes him or her from the inside out, leaving him or her with nothing except a feeling of emptiness.