Roman Fever
Destructive Passion and Past Repetition
In “Roman Fever”
In the short story “Roman Fever” we see a pattern in the lives of the women. I like to call this destructive passion. Destructive passion can be put into a literal term of passion itself. “Passion in itself is an emotion applied to a strong feeling about a person or thing.” (Merriam-Webster online) This also means that passion can be known has having a strong desire towards something or someone. Intense passion in the forms of love, fear, vengefulness, enmity, and jealousy poisons the relationship between Alida Slade and Grace Ansley. We can also see this pattern how it unfolded with Grace’s Great-aunt and how it could possibly unfold with Grace and Alida’s daughters. First we can unfold the destructive behavior of the Great-aunt. “Oh yes; Great –aunt Harriet. The one who was supposed to have sent her young sister out to the Forum after sunset to gather a night blooming flower for her album. All of our great-aunts and grandmothers used to have albums of dried flowers” (Gwynn 99) Here is where we first encounter a history of deceit and destructive behavior that rises from the form of passion for love of another. “Mrs. Slade nodded.”But she really sent her because they were in love with the same man-“(Gwynn 99) We now begin to unravel the destructive actions that Alida has towards Grace. This cycle is starting to pan out for each generation. We have the story of the great-aunt being passed sown to Alida and Grace and undoubtedly will be passed to Jenny and Barbara of their mothers deceit and passion for the same man. In the following exert from the short story we see the passion of hatred unfold from the past of the great-aunt to the past of Alida and Grace. “Well, that was the family tradition. They say Aunt Harriet confessed it years afterward. At any rate, the poor little sister caught the fever and died. Mother used to frighten us with the story when we were children.”(Gwynn 99) We can take two meanings
In “Roman Fever”
In the short story “Roman Fever” we see a pattern in the lives of the women. I like to call this destructive passion. Destructive passion can be put into a literal term of passion itself. “Passion in itself is an emotion applied to a strong feeling about a person or thing.” (Merriam-Webster online) This also means that passion can be known has having a strong desire towards something or someone. Intense passion in the forms of love, fear, vengefulness, enmity, and jealousy poisons the relationship between Alida Slade and Grace Ansley. We can also see this pattern how it unfolded with Grace’s Great-aunt and how it could possibly unfold with Grace and Alida’s daughters. First we can unfold the destructive behavior of the Great-aunt. “Oh yes; Great –aunt Harriet. The one who was supposed to have sent her young sister out to the Forum after sunset to gather a night blooming flower for her album. All of our great-aunts and grandmothers used to have albums of dried flowers” (Gwynn 99) Here is where we first encounter a history of deceit and destructive behavior that rises from the form of passion for love of another. “Mrs. Slade nodded.”But she really sent her because they were in love with the same man-“(Gwynn 99) We now begin to unravel the destructive actions that Alida has towards Grace. This cycle is starting to pan out for each generation. We have the story of the great-aunt being passed sown to Alida and Grace and undoubtedly will be passed to Jenny and Barbara of their mothers deceit and passion for the same man. In the following exert from the short story we see the passion of hatred unfold from the past of the great-aunt to the past of Alida and Grace. “Well, that was the family tradition. They say Aunt Harriet confessed it years afterward. At any rate, the poor little sister caught the fever and died. Mother used to frighten us with the story when we were children.”(Gwynn 99) We can take two meanings
Cited: * Wolff, Cynthia Griffin. A Feast of Words: The Triumph of Edith Wharton. 2nd ed. New York: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, 1995. * [Schriber, Writing Home: American Women Abroad: 1830-1920 (1997), 172].