In Class June 25

“Roman Fever,” by Edith Wharton was one of my favorite short stories we were to read for class. When I was reading this story I wasn’t sure I was going to like it. Some of the wording was confusing to me and it was sort of uneventful for the first five pages. But when Mrs. Slade brings up this letter she wrote acting as her fiancé, things started to spice up a little bit. I thought it portrayed the conniving ways that women or girls can sometimes act. Just the fact that a girl would take pleasure in knowing her best friend was standing around The Coliseum waiting for a guy all night seems cynical to me. The big twist was when Mrs. Ansley reveals that Mrs. Slade’s fiancée actually was there, because it turns out Mrs. Ansley actually responded to the letter, much to Mrs. Slade’s chagrin. I love how this was all thrown back in the face of Mrs. Slade. Especially, because the two have lived across each other for years and this had never been brought up. But the real zinger in this story is the very end. With Mrs. Slade acting very jealously to the news that her beloved husband actually met her that night, she is bashing Mrs. Ansley saying that she had him for “twenty-five years,” and Mrs. Ansley “…had nothing but that one letter that he didn’t write.” At that time Mrs. Ansley before walking away says, “I had Barbara.” This is, I think, the best ending in any of the short stories we read for class. Not only did Mrs. Ansley meet Mrs. Slade’s husband at The Coliseum that night, they actually had sex and Mrs. Ansley was pregnant with Barbara. This was a double-slam to Mrs. Slade, who the author portrays as a less than likeable character, especially because she was always jealous of Barbara and wished her own daughter had been more like her.