The House of the Seven Gables is a novel written in 1851 by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne.
The novel begins:
- Halfway down a by-street of one of our New England towns stands a rusty wooden house, with seven acutely peaked gables,
facing towards various points of the compass, and a huge, clustered chimney in the midst. The street is Pyncheon Street; the
house is the old Pyncheon House; and an elm-tree, of wide circumference, rooted before the door, is familiar to every town-born
child by the title of the Pyncheon Elm.
The Pyncheon family actually existed and were ancestors of American novelist Thomas
Pynchon. The House of the Seven Gables, the building that inspired the
novel, is still standing in Salem, Massachusetts.
Plot summary
The House of the Seven Gables 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 twenty-five years for murder. She refuses all assistance from
her unpleasant wealthy cousin Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon. A distant relative, the 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
lodger Holgrave, who is writing a history of the Pyncheon family.
An organ grinder's visit disturbs the ex-convict's fragile grasp on reality. Judge Pyncheon threatens to have Clifford
committed, but his true purpose is to gain access to the house to search for a lost land deed. Hepzibah and Clifford escape on a
train (then a very modern form of transport) after the judge dies unexpectedly in the house. However, they soon return, to
Phoebe's relief. Events from past and present throw light on the circumstances which sent Clifford to prison, proving his
innocence. The novel ends with the characters leaving the old house to start a new life, free of the burdens of the past.
The House of the Seven Gables is set mainly 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.
Major characters
- Hepzibah Pyncheon - Hepzibah is an unmarried older woman, a descendant of the Pyncheon who built the house of the
title. She is from a high-society class but destitute. At the beginning of the novel, she has opened a cent-shop in the first
floor of the house because of the financial ruin of the family.
- Holgrave - a daguerreotypist who boards at the house.
- Phoebe Pyncheon - a young cousin of Hepzibah's, Phoebe has grown up in the country without airs. She shows up
unannounced and intends to visit for several weeks.
- Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon - He is a well-to-do judge and political aspirant who lives on a comfortable estate out of
town. He has designs on the house where Hepzibah lives. He so strongly resembles the "original" Colonel Pyncheon, who built the
house, that some people mistake portraits of the ancestor for the descendant.
- Clifford Pyncheon - Clifford is Hepzibah's elderly, nearly bed-ridden brother who comes to live in the house after
being released from prison, where he was serving a sentence for a crime unspecified until the end of the novel, though it remains
constantly a question of whether or not he is really capable of such a crime.
- The Baker - The baker's cart was decorated with bells and he sells baked goods.
- The Minstrel's Monkey - This little fellow is described as mischievous. He looks up into the peoples faces pleading
for a penny for his master. Phoebe throws a handful of pennies down on the ground from the arched window for the monkey to
collect and give to the minstrel.
Major themes
Hawthorne, always 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."
Influence
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
stories "The Picture in the House", "The
Shunned House" and The Case of Charles Dexter
Ward.[1]
Adaptations
The novel was notably adapted for the screen in 1940 with Margaret Lindsay as Hepzibah, George Sanders as Jaffrey
and Vincent Price as Clifford. It was directed by Joe May
with a screenplay by Lester Cole.[2] There was also a silent
short in 1910 and a remake
in 1967.
Notes
- ^ S.T. Joshi and David E. Schultz, An H. P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia, p.
107.
- ^ The House of the Seven Gables at IMDB
External links
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