Relationship between Paul Dorrance and Eleanor (Diagnosis)

Eleanor Welwood has been Paul Dorrance’s mistress for 15 years, or as it is said in the text: “(…) for fifteen years past the heaviest burden on his conscience.”[i] She was married to Horace Welwood, who knew about Paul Dorrance - this was the reason that he allowed Eleanor to divorce him. [ii]

Paul Dorrance never felt attracted to Eleanor, only captivated by her, but still liked her as a friend: “He had never meant, he the healthy, vigorous, middle-aged Paul Dorrance, to marry this faded woman for whom he had so long ceased to feel anything but a friendly tenderness.”[iii]

Eleanor, by contrast, has always loved Dorrance and made her dream to make him marry her come true.

The only reason Dorrance wants to marry Eleanor is that he does not want to be alone during the process of dying: “For he understood now that he must marry her; he simply could not live out these last months alone.”[iv] Eleanor managed to trick Dorrance into this marriage, but it is not clarified in the end if Dorrance is happy about her deed or sorely disappointed or angered by it.

Furthermore, Paul Dorrance seems to try hard to fall in love with Eleanor. This seems to be a tilt at windmills: “He continued to look at Mrs. Welwood, as if searching her face for something it was essential he should find there.”[v]

Nevertheless, when Eleanor is on her deathbed, Dorrance seems to be plainly seized by her physical state: “(…) he felt for his wife the same rush of pity as when he had thought himself dying, and known what agony his death would cost her.”[vi]

[i] Cf. Wharton, Edith; Robinson, Roxana (2007): The New York stories of Edith Wharton. New York, NY: New York Review Books (New York Review Books classics). p.386.

[ii] Cf. Ibid. p.387.

[iii] Ibid. p.395.

[iv] Ibid. p.389.

[v] Ibid. p.387.

[vi] Ibid. p.399.