Well, I guess a lot of it depends on what kind of comment
you want to make about this excellent short story by Edith Wharton. Do you wish to focus
on characters, themes or setting for example? Either of these elements will provide you
with ample material to make a "comment," as you put it. For example, if you consider the
relationship between the two women and the conflict that emerges as the story
progresses, you should be able to make a comment on the theme of friendship and how it
is presented in the novel.
Note how the two women are
presented as childhood friends. Yet it is clear that they don't actually know each other
very well, and actually, simmering beneath this longstanding "friendship," lies years of
pent up resentment, anger and jealousy. Note what the narrator tells us about Mrs. Slade
as she imagines the success of her friend's daughter's marriage and the easy and secure
future of her friend:
Mrs. Slade broke off this prophetic flight with a
recoil of self-disgust. There was no one of whom she had less right to think unkindly
than of Grace Ansley. Would she never cure herself of envying her? Perhaps she had begun
too long ago.
Note how this
"friendship" then is actually built on solid blocks of hidden resentment, envy and
jealousy, which of course all comes out as they survey the "great accumulated wreckage
of passion and splendour" at their feet. This would be one possible comment you could
make, but you also might want to think about setting and how that ties in with the
characters and themes of this great short story.
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