| The House of the Seven Gables | |
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First edition title page. |
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| Author(s) | Nathaniel Hawthorne |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Gothic fiction |
| Publisher | Ticknor and Fields |
| Publication date | 1851 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback) |
| ISBN | NA |
The House of the Seven Gables is a Gothic novel written in 1851 by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne and published the same year by Ticknor and Fields of Boston. Hawthorne explores themes of guilt, retribution, and atonement in a New England family and colors the tale with suggestions of the supernatural and witchcraft. The story was inspired by a gabled house in Salem belonging to Hawthorne's cousin Susanna Ingersoll and by those of Hawthorne's ancestors who played a part in the Salem Witch Trials of 1692. The book was well received upon publication and later had a strong influence on the work of H. P. Lovecraft. The House of the Seven Gables has been adapted several times to film and television.
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The novel is set in the mid-19th century, with glimpses into the history of the house, which was built in the late 17th century. The primary interest of this book is in the subtle and involved descriptions of character and motive.
The house of the title is a gloomy New England mansion, haunted from its foundation by fraudulent dealings, accusations of witchcraft, and sudden death. The current resident, the dignified but desperately poor Hepzibah Pyncheon, opens a shop in a side room to support her brother Clifford, who is about to leave prison after serving thirty years for murder. She refuses all assistance from her unpleasant wealthy cousin Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon. A distant relative, the lively and pretty young Phoebe, turns up and quickly becomes invaluable, charming customers and rousing Clifford from depression. A delicate romance grows between Phoebe and the mysterious attic lodger Holgrave, who is writing a history of the Pyncheon family.
Phoebe takes leave of the family to return to her country home for a brief visit, but will return soon. Unfortunately, before she leaves, Clifford stands at the large arched window above the stairs and has a sudden urge to jump upon viewing the mass of humanity passing before him and his recollection of his youth lost to prison. That instance, coupled with Phoebe's departure — she was the only happy and beautiful thing in the home for the depressed Clifford to dwell on — sends Clifford into a bed-ridden state.
Judge Pyncheon arrives at the house one day, and threatens to have Clifford committed to an insane asylum if he does not disclose information regarding mystical "eastern lands" of Maine that the family is rumored to own. The deed however has been lost. Before Clifford can be brought before the Judge (which, it is implied, will completely destroy Clifford's sanity), the Judge mysteriously dies in the same chair as the historical Pyncheon who stole the land on which the house was later built from a settler named Maule. Hepzibah and Clifford escape on a train (then a very new form of transport) after the Judge dies. The townsfolk murmur about their sudden disappearance, and, upon Phoebe's return, the Judge's body is discovered. Hepzibah and Clifford return shortly, to Phoebe's relief. Events from past and present throw light on the circumstances which sent Clifford to prison, proving his innocence. Holgrave is discovered to be a descendant of Maule but bears the Pyncheon family no ill will, mostly due to his feelings for Phoebe. The romance ends with the characters leaving the old house to start a new life, free of the burdens of the past.
The novel begins:
The Pyncheon family actually existed and were ancestors of American novelist Thomas Pynchon.[1]
The House of the Seven Gables in Salem, Massachusetts — today a museum accompanying a settlement house — was at one time owned by Hawthorne's cousin, Susanna Ingersoll, and she entertained him there often. Its seven-gabled state was known to Hawthorne only through childhood stories from his cousin; at the time of his visits, he would have seen just three gables due to architectural renovations. Reportedly, Ingersoll inspired Hawthorne to write the novel, though Hawthorne also stated that the book was a work of complete fiction, based on no particular house.[2]
Hawthorne, frequently haunted by the sins of his ancestors in the Salem witch trials, examines guilt, retribution, and atonement in this novel. His Pyncheon family carries a great burden — for almost 200 years — as a result of the dishonest, amoral way that the land on which the titular house sits was acquired. In the Preface to the novel, he states that its moral is that "the wrongdoing of one generation lives into the successive ones and... becomes a pure and uncontrollable mischief."
However, an opposing theme also emerges. Hawthorne, though guilt-ridden with respect to his ancestors' past, actually does suggest in a number of scenes that the Maule family really are witches. Alice Pyncheon is indirectly killed by Maule's grandson, using his wizard powers (or, more likely, the powers of mesmerism) to enchant her. Meanwhile, the narrator details a phantasm of Colonel Pyncheon's descendants returning to attempt to shake the Colonel's picture off the wall, only to be prevented by the original Maule's ghost and magic. Yet Hawthorne, as ever concerned with the moral and emotional truths behind peoples' actions and appearances, refers to actual witchcraft within the Maule line only within the framing devices of works of the imagination (the incidents above take place within respectively a story written by Holgrave and a dreamlike nighttime reverie hypothesized by the narrator). Similarly, the overall imaginative framework of the novel itself provides a vehicle for Hawthorne to confront the moral and emotional experience of magic: Holgrave, Maule's descendant,gradually enchants Phoebe, throwing over her "love's web of sorcery.".
The House of the Seven Gables was Hawthorne's follow-up to his highly successful novel The Scarlet Letter. It took him ten months to write it, completing it in early 1851.[3] After its publication, Hawthorne said, "It sold finely and seems to have pleased a good many people".[4]
The novel was an inspiration for horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft, who called it "New England's greatest contribution to weird literature" in his essay "Supernatural Horror in Literature". Seven Gables likely influenced Lovecraft's short stories "The Picture in the House", "The Shunned House" and novella The Case of Charles Dexter Ward.[5]
The novel was adapted for the screen in 1940 with Margaret Lindsay as Hepzibah, George Sanders as Jaffrey and Vincent Price as Clifford. In this adaptation, Hepzibah and Clifford were made lovers rather than brother and sister, and the film ends with a double wedding. It was directed by Joe May with a screenplay by Lester Cole.[6] There was also a silent short in 1910 and a remake in 1967. It was also loosely adapted as one of the three stories in the 1963 film Twice-Told Tales, along with "Rappaccini's Daughter" and "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment". All three sections featured Vincent Price. The novel was adapted to a 60-minute television production in 1960 for The Shirley Temple Show with Shirley Temple Temple as Phoebe, Robert Culp as Holgrave, Agnes Moorehead as Hepzibah, and Martin Landau as Clifford.[7]
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