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Things Fall Apart

Decent Essays

The setting of a story is the surrounding of which the story takes place. In Ethan Frome, By Edith Wharton, the setting is in a small town in Massachusetts called Starkfield in the late 1890s. In the book Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, the setting is in a village in Africa around the time of the 19th century. Both settings are very significant to the story and that if it took place anywhere else it would not be the same. The setting is very important to the story through the elements of social expectation, Geological location, and time period. The first element that makes the setting so important is social expectation which traps Ethan in his small town and ultimately killing Okonkwo because of the change. To start, Ethan is trapped by his small town's expectation for him to stay and take care of his sick family. Ethan could have gone to school and made something better out of life; however, because of his parents getting ill then later dying and his wife becoming ill, Ethen was forced to stay and take care of them because society deemed it the right thing to do. Ethan wanted to run away with Mattie, the girl he is in love with, but could not be himself to leaving his sick wife because even if he left everything for her I was still not the right thing to do. Because Ethan felt trapped he was willing to die with Mattie in a sledding accident. If society did not trap Ethan in the small town then he would have gone to school, he could have run away with Mattie and start a

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