Gothic Elements in The Haunting of Hill House - Essay Example

Gothic Elements in The Haunting of Hill House Gothic literature is characterized by its unique way of combining horror and romance to create a completely new genre that, particularly after the advent of Sigmund Freud and his psychoanalytic theory, focused more and more on the power of the mind to terrify itself. Common elements found within Gothic literature include terror, the supernatural, ghosts, haunted houses with a particular type of architecture, castles, darkness, death, madness, secrets and hereditary curses. Characters typically fall into stereotypical personas such as the femmes fatales, flawed heroes, monsters of various types and flawed individuals. Shirley Jackson’s book “The Haunting of Hill House” is easily characterized as a Gothic novel based on the presence of many of these characteristics within its pages. The story is basically that of a young woman who goes insane as a result of supernatural influences when she is invited to stay for a summer at a castle-like home located far from the next nearest seat of civilization in a dark and gloomy portion of the country. To explore how “The Haunting of Hill House” can be considered a Gothic novel, and thus begin to understand the concepts of Gothic literature itself, three elements of Gothic literature will be examined as they apply to the novel. The discovery of how the novel uses the concepts of the sublime, the castle and the Gothic psychomachy will reveal much about the common elements of Gothic literature. The idea of the sublime is not unique to Gothic literature, but the way in which it is applied often can be. The sublime refers to the presence of something that isn’t there, something intangible that is nevertheless felt. While often used in other texts to refer to something that is beneficial and ‘Godlike’, this concept also lends itself strongly to the Gothic novel. This is because the idea of the sublime can be heavenly as easily as it can be founded on the concepts of hell. With the Gothic novel’s concentration on the supernatural and the idea of ghosts, the sublime translates into the novel as the sense of an otherworldly presence that might or might not be discernable to the characters. Within Jackson’s novel, the idea of the sublime is pushed to its ultimate level without losing its meaning. This is particularly evident in the many instances that Jackson allows something to happen that remains forever unknown to the reader and to many of the other characters as well. During their stay at Hill House, all four of the primary characters begin to experience frightening events of a supernatural nature. This occurs whether they are in the house or simply on the grounds. These events are made all the more terrifying because of their mysterious, sublime nature. An example of this is found in the cold spot as the characters begin touring the house and enter the nursery. The doctor passes through the doorway and asks if there could be a draft across the doorway. Theodora mentions it is “like the doorway of a tomb” (118) and Eleanor “felt with incredulity the piercing cold that struck her between one step and the next; it was like passing through a wall of ice” (119). The doctor explains that this must be the heart of the house as Luke determines that there is no draft and Eleanor experiences the odd threatening nature of the nursery inside. It is tangible in that “the line of nursery animals painted along the wall seemed somehow not at all jolly, but as thought they were trapped … The nursery, larger than the other bedrooms, had an indefinable air of neglect found nowhere else in Hill House” (119) but there was nothing physically out of place. Banging on Theodora’s door at night occurs “against the upper edge of the door, higher than either of them could reach, higher than Luke or the doctor could reach, and the sickening, degrading cold came in waves from whatever was outside the door” (130). Despite this, the women have the impression that small hands are seeking around the doorframe for a means of entry, the doorknob moves but is locked, they hear a small giggle and the wood of the door shakes with new pounding and nothing can found outside the door when the men come up. While there is undoubtedly a malevolent presence, as the men discuss their wild-ghost chase through the house and out onto the grounds, much of this can not be directly seen or understood by the characters. An almost essential aspect of the Gothic novel is the setting within a dark and brooding castle or house that is remotely located and somehow threatening just in itself. Jackson’s novel is no exception to this rule as Hill House enters the story. Even the approach to the house has the same kind of ominous, unwelcoming feel to it one would associate with a notorious haunted house. Eleanor must drive carefully over a rock-strewn road and, despite her care, her “car cracked against a rock and reeled back across the road with an ominous scraping somewhere beneath, but then gathered itself valiantly and resumed its dogged climb. The tree branches brushed against the windshield, and it grew steadily darker” (27), making Eleanor wonder if the sun ever shined in this desolate place. Her first impression of the house itself is that it is vile and she must leave. However, she doesn’t leave and the house is described in more detail. “This house, which seemed somehow to have formed itself, flying together into its own powerful pattern under the hands of its builders, fitting itself into its own construction of lines and angles, reared its great head back against the sky without concession to humanity. It was a house without kindness, never meant to be lived in, not a fit place for people or for love or for hope. Exorcism cannot alter the countenance of a house; Hill House would stay as it was until it was destroyed” (35). The interior of the house is as dark as the exterior, with strange cupids and lacy filigrees in the upper corners and “rooms entirely inside rooms” in places that have “no windows, no access to the outdoors” while the doctor explains that windows were also frequently “heavily shrouded with hangings and draperies within, and shrubbery without” (64). The doors swing shut of their own accord and the interior is much like a maze, confusing guests as they attempt to make their way to the simplest of locations. As Doctor Montague explains to his guests, the house’s history is full of violence, death and insanity. Throughout the story, the house definitely develops its own character and personality in keeping with this description, always threatening, always cynical and always just on the edge of awareness. This is first suggested when Eleanor looks upon the house for the first time, “No human eye can isolate the unhappy coincidence of line and place which suggests evil in the face of a house, and yet somehow a maniac juxtaposition, a badly turned angle, some chance meeting of roof and sky, turned Hill House into a place of despair, more frightening because the face of Hill House seemed awake, with a watchfulness from the blank windows and a touch of glee in the eyebrow of the cornice” (34). This non-physical element of the house comes through in various passages that reflect the sublime element of gothic fiction as well. The characters, in discussing the house’s history, all agree that the house has simply been waiting for someone else to come try its strength. “Essentially … the evil is the house itself, I think. It has enchained and destroyed its people and their lives, it is a place of contained ill will” (82). As the personality of the house slowly begins to invade Eleanor’s senses, she becomes a new part of it, feeling the other characters as they move through it, dancing with its statues and feeling the “stone floor move caressingly, rubbing itself against the soles of her feet” (232). As she is being forced to leave, she can feel every element of the house and place every article, finally convincing herself that she should not leave. Psychometry refers to the idea of a conflict between the body and the soul. It was an often-used technique in Gothic novels because of the obvious relationship of this to the concept of madness. In Jackson’s story, Gothic psychometry can be found most readily within the character of Eleanor as she slowly loses her ability to discern between what is really there, or perhaps sublimely there would be a more accurate term, and what is a manifestation of her imagination only. It is difficult to tell whether Eleanor is going insane or is being possessed by the house itself. This is so because of the difficulty she has in distinguishing between fact and fantasy during her drive to the house. One example of this is when she stops to look closer at a stand of tended oleanders that extended beyond a gate and encircled a square. “Inside the oleander square there was nothing, no house, no building, nothing but the straight road going across and ending at the stream” (19). With this scene established, she imagines herself entering the square and breaking a magic spell. “I will walk up low stone steps past stone lions guarding and into a courtyard where a fountain plays and the queen waits, weeping, for the princess to return” (20). While she is able to recognize her fantasy as such at this early point in the story, as the novel progresses, Eleanor becomes less and less able to discern fact from fiction. Eleanor’s growing inability to separate fantasy from reality is manipulated by the house itself, making it difficult to determine whether Eleanor is truly going insane or if she is merely being possessed by the malevolent spirits of the house. As she explores the verandah outside, Luke finds her precariously balanced on the railing looking up at the tower. “Don’t trust your balance in my charming Hill House,” Luke warns her and Eleanor’s reaction is to try to “steady herself in the rocking world where the trees and the lawns seemed somehow tilted sideways and the sky turned and swung” (113). As is explained by Luke, she had been standing almost sideways and Theodora reveals she has several times felt as if she were walking up the wall. This begins to illustrate the conflict occurring within Eleanor’s spirit as her soul becomes in tune with the house but her body remains trapped within the confines of physical law. Eleanor is not entirely to blame for her disorientation as the house is going out of its way to entice her, writing her name on the wall as a call to her to join it. She finally crosses the threshold between fantasy and reality when the knocking on the doors that had so frightened her on her first night in the house becomes a noise Eleanor believes she herself is making toward the end, “it’s inside my head, Eleanor thought, putting her hands over her face, it’s inside my head and it’s getting out, getting out, getting out” (202). The suggestion that the house itself was causing Eleanor’s madness is provided in the final pages. As she deliberately turns her car into the large tree, “In the unending, crashing second before the car hurled into the tree she thought clearly, ‘Why am I doing this? Why am I doing this? Why don’t they stop me?” (245-246). Through abstract concepts such as the sublime and psychomachy as well as tangible elements such as the dark and brooding lonely old house, Jackson is able to convey a story that gnaws at the nerves. With these tools, she is constantly building up pressure and instilling horror and doubt regarding what one might think to be inviolate territory, the space of one’s own mind. It is this sense that we cannot trust our own perceptions, our own thoughts or the spaces around us that truly breeds terror and it is this that gives Gothic literature its morbid fascination. Works Cited Jackson, Shirley. The Haunting of Hill House. New York: Penguin, 1959. Read More