LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature 16(1) October 2021 p-ISSN 1858-0165
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137

The Clipped Life of the Wife in Edith Wharton’S
Short Story Entitled “A Journey”

Ratna Asmarani
Faculty of Humanities - Diponegoro University

ratna_asmarani@yahoo.com

Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the life of the young wife that is clipped by many “othering”
factors that prevent her from becoming a Self. The analysis is focused on the “othering” factors and
the impacts on the young wife and on her relationship with her sick husband. The analysis is done
through the perspective of existentialism combining the existentialism of Sartre and Beauvoir. Since
the focus is on the female character, the particular perspective used is on the existential feminism
focusing on the “woman-being-for-others” mode of being. The methods of research are the
combination of library research method with its close-reading technique, the qualitative method, and
the contextual method of literary analysis. The result shows that it is difficult for a wife to be a Self
when she has to face many “othering” factors such as the husband’s illness, the doctors’ suggestion to
move to a temperate climate State, the new environment, and the death of the husband while they are
still on the train. These “othering” factors do not only clip the wife’s socialization, love and
relationship with her husband, and anticipation to return home, but also clip the wife’s life so that she
will never have a chance to be a Self forever.
Keywords: existentialism, “othering” factors, contextual method of literary analysis

INTRODUCTION
“A Journey” is a short story written by a prolific
American female writer, Edith Wharton (1862-
1937). It is about a young wife who takes her sick
husband home to die after a futile effort of
following doctors’ suggestion to stay in a hot
climate area for several months. On the train
journey back home, the wife has flashes of
thoughts and emotions concerning her husband’s
bad health and its impacts on her previous plans
and hopes. The young wife tries to conceal the
death of the husband on the train due to her fear of
causing more troubles until she experiences an
unexpected accident causing her own death on the
train next to her death husband’s body.

Based on the brief summary of the short story,
this paper will deal with the clipped life of the wife
from the existentialism perspective. This focus has
never been dealt before as shown in the following
previous study. Neilson in “Edith Wharton, A
Journey” relates the short story with the author’s

life (2010). Whitehead in “Make It Short: Edith
Wharton’s Modernist Practices in Her Short
Stories” talks about “Wharton’s Narrative Gaps,
Ellipses and Absences” (2012). Tanguay in ““A
Journey” by Edith Wharton” talks about “Female
Roles in Relationships” and also relates the short
story with the author’s life (2012). Pete in ““A
Journey” Literally and Figuratively” talks on the
wife’s mourning which is carefully hidden (2013).
Chelseaicard in “The Dark Days” (2013) relates the
short story with the social condition of that time.
Preston in “A Journey” focuses on the plot and
character (2014). Dermot in “A Journey by Edith
Wharton” talks about the theme of “change,
acceptance, gender roles, loyalty, independence,
conflict and social opinion” (2018).

To support the discussion focusing on the
wife’s clipped life from the perspective of
existentialism, several concepts are used in this
paper. The first is the concept of existentialism.
Here it is particularly about Sartre’s existentialism,

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which is from male perspective of Sartre is defined
in a simple way as “a concern with the living
person and his concrete emotions of anguish,
despair, nausea, and the like” (Sartre, 1978: xvi).
Another concept from Sartre borrowed for the
discussion is his concept on the modes of being
which consists of three modes; namely, Being-in-
itself (etre‐en‐soi), Being-for-itself (etre‐pour‐soi), and
Being-for-others (etre‐pour‐autrui)

According to Jean Paul Sartre (1905-1980),
the first mode of being, Being-in-itself (etre‐en‐soi)
is “Non-conscious Being” (Sartre, 1978: 629).
Being-in-itself is an existence without
consciousness or in other words it is not an
existence of the humans. The second mode of
being or Being-for-itself (etre‐pour‐soi) is “The
nihilation of Being-in-itself; consciousness
conceived as a lack of Being, a desire for Being, a
relation to Being” (Sartre, 1978: 629). Being-for-
itself is the existence of the humans or the
existence of the conscious being. The third mode of
being, namely Being-for-others (etre‐pour‐autrui) is
“my Self exists outside as an object for others. The
For-others involves a perpetual conflict as each
For-itself seeks to recover its own Being by directly
or indirectly making an object out of the other”
(Sartre, 1978: 629). Being-for-others is the social
existence of beings in which the Self meets the
others. There is always a conflict because each
existence wants to be the Self or the powerful
center contesting with the other Self.

Sartre’s existentialism with the modes of
being has the male perspective. This male
perspective is brought into female sphere by
Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986) “her philosophy is
focused in the existentialism of Sartre … she states
in general how certain existentialist concepts …
apply to woman's situation” (Beauvoir, 1956: 8).
Known as an existential feminist, de Beauvoir
states that “She is defined and differentiated with
reference to man and not he with reference to her;
she is the incidental, the inessential as opposed to
the essential. He is the Subject, he is the Absolute-
she is the Other'” (Beauvoir, 1956: 16). De Beauvoir
places the woman in the Other position in the Self-
Other relationship. Thus in Beauvoir’s opinion, the

woman or the Other is always in conflicting
situation with the Self in her subordinate position.

Viewing the woman as the Other, de
Beauvoir has a specific view on marriage: “for the
vast majority of unmarried workers entertain the
hope - often enough illusive - that marriage will
release them from work in which they have no real
interest and which they regard as a temporary
burden” (Beauvoir, 1956: 10). She views that for
most women, marriage is supposed to be an ideal
escape from a burdening life as female workers.
However, de Beauvoir states that it is an illusive
hope. On the other side, de Beauvoir views that
“Marriage, whatever its form- monogamy,
polygamy, or polyandry- was only a secular
accident, creating no mystical tie. It involved no
servitude for the wife, for she was still integrated
with her clan” (Beauvoir, 1956: 92). She states that
although the wife is dependent on the husband, for
social status and economy, she may not totally
under the power of the husband since she still has
a tight connection with her own big family where
she comes from. Thus marriage is not a total
bonding for the wife, at least psychologically
and/or emotionally.

Referring to Sartre’s modes of being and
reversing de Beauvoir’s positioning of woman as
the Other, the existential feminist perspective used
in this study will focus on the woman. Positioning
the woman as the center of attention, then Sartre’s
Being-for-itself is formulized as “Woman-being-
for-herself” in which the woman has her own
consciousness. Meanwhile Sartre’s Being-for-
others is analogous to “Woman-being-for-others”
in the existential feminist perspective focusing
woman as the Self or center of attention in conflict
with others. Others here can be in the form of
males in whatever relation and profession, other
females, or other forms of existence that must be
faced by the woman as the Self, such as disease,
moving out, new surroundings, etc.

Supported with the new formula of modes
of being which focuses on the woman as the Self,
the analysis on the clipped life of the wife in the
short story entitled “A Journey” by Edith Wharton
is done. The discussion will focus on the
“Othering” aspects, the aspects that aim to block

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the female to become a Self, a free individual that
can develop and actualize herself, that must be
faced by the wife and its impacts on her
relationship with her husband and on herself.

METHODOLOGY
The data collection to support the discussion is
done through library research method while the
data analysis is done through close-reading
method. The general analysis is done through
qualitative method while the contextual method of
analysis is focused on the literary analysis
combining intrinsic and extrinsic prose elements
(Behrendt, 2018). The intrinsic elements focusses
on the character, setting, and conflict while the
extrinsic elements are based on Sartre’s modes of
being and de Beauvoir’s opinion on marriages for
women.

Since the focus of analysis is a woman and the
writer is also a woman, the perspective taken is a
feminist criticism: “Feminist criticism reads
writing and examines its ideology and culture with
a woman-centred perspective. Criticism is feminist
if it critiques existing disciplines, traditional
paradigms about women, nature or social roles, or
documents such as work by others, from the point
of view of women” (Humm, 1995: 51). The
particular feminist perspective applied in the
discussion is the existential feminism perspective.
This particular perspective is based on the
modification of Sartre’s modes of being from the
perspective of the female since the focus of the
discussion is on the modes of being of the female
character, while de Beauvoir’s concept of Other is
modified to refer to the parties which are against
the female character’s effort to construct her modes
of being.

RESULT AND DISCUSSION
The discussion concerning the wife who has no
given name, especially about her clipped life, will
be divided into two phases: the phase of moving to
Colorado and the phase of returning to New York.
The two phases finally lead to the tragically
clipped life of the wife.

Before the marriage, the young woman is
like being entrapped in a boring life. She is a
school teacher who does not seem to have a bright
future: “When they married, she had such arrears
of living to make up: her days had been as bare as
the white-washed schoolroom where she forced
innutritious facts upon reluctant children”
(Wharton, 2001: 65). Her life is not joyful at all. She
does not enjoy her job as a teacher too much and
the children are also unwilling to pay attention to
her teaching. She also thinks that she does not do
useful job as a teacher. Thus it can be said that she
does a boring job to earn a living to support her
life. In other words her work has no promise to
open an exciting life for her, something that she
longs so much.

She hopes so much from her marriage. She
expects her marriage leads her to a wider, joyful,
exciting, and fulfilling life: “His coming had
broken in on the slumber of circumstance,
widening the present till it became the encloser of
remotest chances. But imperceptibly the horizon
narrowed” (Wharton, 2001: 65). She is like a
sleeping beauty waiting for a prince to awaken her
and guide her into a kingdom of joy. However, the
moment of freeing happiness is too short. A
haunting darkness is creeping slowly but surely.

Phase 1: Moving to Colorado
They start their marriage optimistically. They

enjoy life to the fullest feeling that the future is
theirs to live in as they want: “A year ago their
pulses had beat to one robust measure; both had
the same prodigal confidence in an exhaustless
future” (Wharton, 2001:65). The wife’s flash of
memory shows their readiness to face the happy
future.

“Othering” Agents
The expected bright future does not come.

Some “othering” agents are ready to destroy their
hope and their future. The first “othering” agent is
in the form of a disease suffered by the husband.
The sudden disease that has no name at first is not
considered as a serious one; thus it does not need
too serious treatment: “At first the doctors had

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said that six weeks of mild air would set him right;
but when he came back this assurance was
explained as having of course included a winter in
a dry climate” (Wharton, 2001: 66). However, the
treatment in the form of staying for several weeks
in a place with temperate weather has no
significant effect. Thus the doctors suggest that he
should avoid winter by staying in a dry-climate
area. It can be concluded that he is vulnerable to
cold weather.

The next “othering” agent is in the form of the
doctors. They have a big role to the life of the
newly-wed couple. The doctors’ suggestion makes
the new couple move from New York to Colorado
to avoid the harsh winter: “They gave up their
pretty house, storing the wedding presents and
new furniture, and went to Colorado” (Wharton,
2001: 66). The couple leaves comfortable situation
at home to move to a new place where they know
nobody as suggested by the doctors for the sake of
curing the husband’s disease.

The third “othering” agent is the new city,
Colorado, and the new neighbors. Although it is
only described briefly, it can be seen obviously that
the wife feels alienated in the new place. She is a
stranger there and she cannot fit in: “She had
hated it there from the first. Nobody knew her or
cared about her” (Wharton, 2001:66). The wife feels
like being uprooted without her consent to drift in
an unfamiliar place. She is alone and lonely with
her sick husband. She is now in the position of the
“other”, the displaced person.

Clipped Socialization of the Wife
The agents of “othering” are able to change

the life of the young wife. The first effect is on the
new social life that she has just entered. It is too
short for her to enjoy it: “there was no one to
wonder at the good match she had made, or to
envy her the new dresses and the visiting-cards
which were still a surprise to her” (Wharton, 2001:
66). Deep down her heart she feels reluctant to
leave her new social life. She is so proud with her
marriage and her ideal husband. She still wants to
savor her great achievement. She herself
sometimes does not believe in her own luck. Thus,
it indicates that her marriage takes her to a higher

social status that she has dreamed so far. Now, all
the newly-got social life has to be left due to the
husband’s disease and the doctors’ suggestion.

Even sadder is that she cannot have
normal social life in the new place. Her life now is
only around the sick husband consisting of taking
care of him and giving medicine regularly. For her
it is as tedious as her former job as a teacher: “The
routine of the sick-room bewildered her; this
punctual administering of medicine seemed as idle
as some uncomprehended religious mummery”
(Wharton, 2001: 66). She feels that she is just doing
an unending circular activity leading to unclear
result. This event also indicates that the wife
cannot actualize herself as a potential person. She
is bound to her sick husband. She has no life of her
own, let alone fill it with things that she wants to
do.

When the doctors finally let them returning
home, not because the husband has been
recuperating but because the doctors see that there
is nothing else that they can do to ease the
husband’s disease, she secretly feels so happy:
“How she had rejoiced when the doctors at last
gave their consent to his going home! She knew, of
course, what the decision meant; they both knew.
It meant that he was to die” (Wharton, 2001: 66-67).
Although the journey home means preparing the
death of her husband, she feels relieved because at
least she will return to the familiar surrounding
with familiar people. She will not be lonely and
alone with her sick husband anymore: “she had
perhaps been too long alone with him, and that she
would feel differently when they were at home
again, surrounded by her robust and buoyant
family” (Wharton, 2001: 66). The presence of her
family will become a great support for her
emotionally and psychologically. Her relief to
return home is implied in the following quotation:
“she hung out of the window waving unregretful
farewells to the acquaintances she had really never
liked till then” (Wharton, 2001: 67). She does not
feel sad at all to leave the new friends. She is eager
to go home.

Clipped Love and Relationship of the Wife to
the Husband

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Besides clipping the new social circle of the
young wife, the agents of “othering” especially in
the form of the no-name disease also clips the love
and relationship of the wife to the husband. The
disease changes the husband. Previously the
husband is the healthy, leader type person but
now he becomes a weak, dependent person. The
role has changed in which the wife must become
the guard and the keeper:

The man she had married had been strong,
active, gently masterful: the male whose pleasure
it is to clear a way through the material
obstructions of life; but now it was she who was
the protector, he who must be shielded from
importunities and given his drops or his beef-juice
though the skies were falling (Wharton, 2001: 66).

The young wife is not ready and happy with
the new role. She marries because she wants to be
protected not vice versa.

The gap in their physical relationship is
getting wider. The husband is becoming weaker
and weaker while the wife is healthy and energetic.
She still longs for adventures which cannot be
fulfilled by her sickly husband: “Now their
energies no longer kept step: hers still bounded
ahead of life, preëmpting unclaimed regions of
hope and activity, while his lagged behind, vainly
struggling to overtake her” (Wharton, 2001: 66).
Unconsciously they are drifted apart. Their
interests are no longer the same. The young wife
has to curb her desire to have an active and
fulfilling life, as can be seen in the following
quotation: “When she still found his old self in his
eyes as they groped for each other through the
dense medium of his weakness. But these
moments had grown rare” (Wharton, 2001: 66).
Their sexual activities also become rarer and rarer
and less qualified. The husband’s disease is
successful in “othering” the young wife’s desires
and wants.

The illness also makes the wife and
husband like strangers. The gap between them is
getting wider and wider. They are close physically
but far apart emotionally:

… this increasing childish petulance seemed
to give expression to their imperceptible

estrangement. Like two faces looking at one
another through a sheet of glass they were close
together, almost touching, but they could not hear
or feel each other: the conductivity between them
was broken (Wharton, 2001: 66).

The sick husband becomes more difficult to
appease while the young wife is getting more
depressed. Both are being “othered” by the long-
lasting illness. Their perseverance to face the
illness hand in hand is weakened with the passing
of time. Their emotional bond is at the vulnerable
point. Nobody can be blamed, each faces his/her
“othering” phantom.

The young wife senses this widening gap of
separation. She is not close to her husband
anymore. There is a kind of unconscious reluctance:
“Her hand avoided his damp soft skin, which had
lost the familiar roughness of health: she caught
herself furtively watching him as she might have
watched a strange animal. It frightened her to feel
that this was the man she loved” (Wharton, 2001:
66). They are like strangers in a different side of the
abyss. She is eyeing her husband curiously. The
young wife is shocked with this condition because
it makes her question her feeling to her husband.

Sensing the emotional separation, her
reaction is typical, she feels guilty and blames
herself: “She, at least, had this sense of
separation … Doubtless the fault was hers. She
was too impenetrably healthy to be touched by the
irrelevancies of disease” (Wharton, 2001: 66). She
blames herself for being healthy unlike her
husband. It is ironical because she is very healthy
while her husband is so sick. Thus in her position
of being “othered” by the husband’s disease the
young wife is “othering” herself further. In her
cornered position she feels that “Life had a grudge
against her: she was never to be allowed to spread
her wings” (Wharton, 2001: 66). It is her fate to be
the “other”. She cannot avoid what is constructed
for her. She cannot live her life to the fullest. That
kind of life is not for her. Her life is not hers to
construct and fulfilled.

Phase 2: Returning to New York

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The doctors’ permission to return home open
a new possibility for the wife if not for the
husband since it means that there is no more
alternative to cure the disease. In other words, they
are going home in order to bury the dying
husband soon. The trip from Colorado to New
York take around three days by train. This time the
young wife is happily anticipating to meet her
family and the familiar surrounding that they have
left before.

Clipped Anticipation of the Wife
However, this return trip is not easy because

the husband’s illness is getting worse and worse.
Again the “othering” agent in the form of serious
illness has a big role in the journey home. As stated
by the wife, they can pass the first day of the
return trip well enough: “The first twenty-four
hours had passed off well. He revived a little and it
amused him to look out of the window and to
observe the humours of the car” (Wharton, 2001:
67). The wife can relax a bit while nurturing her
hope of returning home safely. She is too tired to
face another problem in the train journey.

Again, her wife’s simple hope is not met fully.
The second day on the train does not run as well as
the first day. The husband’s condition is getting
worse: “The second day he began to grow
weary … That night he slept badly and the next
morning his temperature frightened her”
(Wharton, 2001: 67). The young wife’s distress is
accumulated with the passage of time. This
condition is worsened by the disturbing attention
from the other passengers and the train porter.
Their intention is good, actually, but the haunting
attention burdened the wife because she loses her
privacy and has to answer their silent questions
concerning her husband‘s condition: “She felt the
others observing him too, and hovered restlessly
between him and the line of interrogative eyes”
(Wharton, 2001: 67). Actually, their constant
curiosity serves as an “othering” agent not only to
the wife but also to the sick husband.
Unconsciously it clips the freedom of the wife to be
herself and to relax a bit during the distressful
journey.

Before the wife goes to her own berth to
rest, she accompanies her husband in his berth
while preparing him to sleep: “The hours dragged
on in a dreary inoccupation. Towards dusk she sat
down beside him and he laid his hand on hers. The
touch startled her” (Wharton, 2001: 67). The young
wife who is so stressful and preoccupied with her
own thought almost does not realize her husband’s
presence. She is too tense to get home and to meet
her family. Deep down in her heart she wants to
share her burden with the people that she knows
well.

The cheerful thought of meeting the
members of her family “This time to-morrow—”
(Wharton, 2001: 67) makes her go to bed feeling
rather relieved: “she tried to cheer herself with the
thought that in less than twenty-four hours they
would be in New York. Her people would all be at
the station to meet her—she pictured their round
unanxious faces pressing through the crowd”
(Wharton, 2001: 68). Tomorrow evening she will be
with the familiar faces who will help her taking
care of the dying husband. She will not be alone
again. Can her simple hope be fulfilled?

The weary young wife sleeps a long but
troubled sleep. She wakes up in the morning,
feeling fresh and happy:

It was always a struggle for her not to be
cheerful in the morning. Her cheeks burned
deliciously under the coarse towel and the wet hair
about her temples broke into strong upward
tendrils. Every inch of her was full of life and
elasticity. And in ten hours they would be at
home!” (Wharton, 2001: 67).

The quotation indicates that the young wife is
basically a healthy, cheerful, energetic person. It is
so sad that such a person has to curb her bouncing
energy for a long time. At this moment, every
nerve in the young wife’s body is anticipating for a
brighter moment after the long gloomy period in
an unfamiliar place that they have just left.

The optimistic anticipation of the wife is
drastically clipped by the startling fact. It is
startling but not unpredicted. It is the death of the
husband on the train that is so startling:

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She leaned over him and drew up the shade.
As she did so she touched one of his hands. It felt
cold . . . She bent closer, laying her hand on his
arm and calling him by name. He did not move …
His head fell back; his face looked small and
smooth; he gazed at her with steady eyes”
(Wharton, 2001: 69).

When she optimistically wakes her husband
in the morning, she finds out that he has already
died during the night. This fact is not anticipated
by the young wife.

The Fear of Facing the Worst Fact Alone
The young wife is shocked by the fact that

now she is alone, among strangers on the train,
with the dead body of her husband. She is
panicked when she remembers her unforgettable
experience seeing the incident of the death on the
train:

In a terrifying flash of remembrance there
arose before her a scene she had once witnessed in
travelling, when a husband and wife, whose child
had died in the train, had been thrust out at some
chance station … she had never forgotten the
dazed look with which they followed the receding
train” (Wharton, 2001: 69).

That incident traumatizes her and she does
not want to experience the same shocking fate. The
fear almost makes her paralyzed. However she has
to find a way to save her from the same disaster:
“At all costs she must conceal the fact that he was
dead” (Wharton, 2001: 70). This is her solution to
overcome her fear of being stranded with the dead
husband’s body in an unfamiliar railway station.

She tries to prolong the other passengers
and the porter from knowing the death of her
husband till the train is on the way to the last
station. If known before the train enters the last
station, she will not face any problem. However
the effort to conceal the fact that her husband has
already died is not easy for her who has been
gripped by fear. The young wife closes the curtains
tightly in order to hide the dead body of her
husband: “She noticed that they still parted

slightly with the motion of the car, and finding a
pin in her dress she fastened them together”
(Wharton, 2001: 70). For a moment the situation is
safe for her. The biggest thread comes from the
porter whose job is to tidy up the berth in the
morning including opening the curtains closing
the berth. The young wife can postpone the porter
from opening the curtains by saying that he has
not woken up yet (Wharton, 2001: 70), but the
excuse will not last long. After a moment he
returns and: “At length he said: “Ain’t he going to
get up? You know we’re ordered to make up the
berths as early as we can”” (Wharton, 2001: 70). He
has to do his job as instructed because if not he will
get certain sanction.

Another way taken by the young wife to
buy time is by asking the porter to get the
husband’s morning milk and she herself will take
it to her sick husband. To give the impression that
her husband has drunk the milk “She decided to
drink the milk” (Wharton, 2001: 70). This trick only
lasts for a while because:

… after a while the porter came back to get it.
“When’ll I fold up his bed?” he asked.
“Oh, not now—not yet; he’s ill—he’s very ill.

Can’t you let him stay as he is? The doctor wants
him to lie down as much as possible.”

He scratched his head. “Well, if he’s really
sick—”

He took the empty glass and walked away,
explaining to the passengers that the party behind
the curtains was too sick to get up just yet
(Wharton, 2001: 70).

The young wife has to use another strategy to
hide the real condition of her husband. She begs
for the porter’s tolerance by stating that her sick
husband needs a lot of rest according to the
doctor’s suggestion. However, this strategy draws
much attention to herself again and to the tightly
closed curtains. The previous passengers and the
new ones are curious and some offer helps to take
care of her husband. She firmly declines the offers
which make the passengers becomes more curious.
Thus, whatever the young wife’s effort to hide the
death of her husband, she always becomes the

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144

object of attention. The young wife has no freedom
of her own.

The Inner Turmoil Triggered by Excessive
Fear

The fear of being known that she has hidden
the fact that her husband has died some time
before makes the young wife more and more
panicked. She fully realizes that she has to act
convincingly to avoid suspicion when the train
comes to the last destination in New York and the
death of her husband is publicly known: “I must
pretend I don’t know. I must pretend I don’t know.
When they open the curtains I must go up to him
quite naturally—and then I must scream”
(Wharton, 2001: 73). However, fear and guilt are
still haunting her. Now she is the prey of her own
fear and guilt. The clashing of fear and guilt
exhausts her and she is on the brink of
hallucination: “she gazed fixedly at the curtains …
through it she saw her husband’s face—his dead
face … close in front of her, small and smooth, was
her husband’s face … and suddenly she felt the
touch of his smooth skin” (Wharton, 2001: 74). She
is haunted by the death face of her husband. She
cannot avoid seeing his husband’s death face
wherever she looks.

The young wife, after eating a bit of biscuit
and a sip of her husband’s brandy finally can sleep.
However it is a troubled sleep filled with
frightening dream which look like a real one:

She was dead in her turn, and lay beside him
with smooth upstaring face. How quiet it was!—
and yet she heard feet coming, the feet of the men
who were to carry them away . . . She could feel
too—she felt a sudden prolonged vibration, a
series of hard shocks, and then another plunge into
darkness: the darkness of death this time (Wharton,
2001: 75).

In her dream the young wife sees that she is
dead and the efforts to bring her alive are futile. It
turns out that this strange dream is a kind of
premonition to the young, healthy wife’s fate.

Waking up in a confusing mind due to the
troubled sleep, the young wife is further bewilders

by the fact that the train is approaching the last
station:

the train passed into the Harlem tunnel. The
journey was over; in a few minutes she would see
her family pushing their joyous way through the
throng at the station. Her heart dilated. The worst
terror was past . . .” (Wharton, 2001: 75).

For a moment a hope is budding in the young
wife’s mind. She is so relieved that her burden will
be over soon. She will be with her family. She will
be safe to start a new step in her life.

This relieving thought is cut by the
porter’s question that brings her back to the fact
that she is still hiding the husband’s death: ““We’d
better get him up now, hadn’t we?” asked the
porter, touching her arm. He had her husband’s
hat in his hand and was meditatively revolving it
under his brush” (Wharton, 2001: 75). The porter,
in doing his job, clips the young wife’s happy
thought. The young wife, abruptly drawn into the
personally frightening reality, is so distracted.
Moreover, the porter is holding the dead
husband’s hat. Seeing the hat, the young wife gets
so panicked. The young wife who is standing at
that time suddenly loses her balance because of the
sudden dark situation. It is not clear whether the
dark situation is caused by the train’s entering a
tunnel or by the sudden fainting of the wife due to
her panic. Whatever the cause, the effect of the
wife’s losing her balance is so tragically fatal: “She
looked at the hat and tried to speak; but suddenly
the car grew dark. She flung up her arms,
struggling to catch at something, and fell face
downward, striking her head against the dead
man’s berth” (Wharton, 2001: 75). This accident
clips the young wife’s life. She loses her life a
moment before she get off the train to meet her
family. There is no more chance for her to have a
new start as aptly represented by the following
quotation: “Life had a grudge against her: she was
never to be allowed to spread her wings”
(Wharton, 2001: 66). From the start the energetic
and healthy young wife is fated to have a clipped
life. Everything is against her effort to have a life
that lets her to actualize herself.

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145

CONCLUSION
Being a Self is not an easy matter, particularly for a
wife as portrayed in Edith Wharton’s short story
entitled “A Journey”. There are too many obstacles
that must be faced all alone. The husband’s illness,
the doctors’ suggestion to move to a temperate-
climate area, the new surrounding are some that
must be handled by the wife alone leaving no
chance for her to be herself. There is a hope for the
wife to be herself when they are allowed to return
home by the doctors who have given up. However
this hope is clipped by the death of the husband on
the train before arriving home. Trying to buy time
by hiding the death of the husband, the fear of
being known creates a paralyzing inner conflict
leading to the clipped life of the young wife due to
losing her balance inside the still running train.
Thus, to be a Self and to be herself is not possible
for the young wife since she has to face “the
others” who have a big power to clip every chance
for her to be a Self and herself.

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