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The House of the Seven Gables

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Nathaniel Hawthorne is probably one of the most despised figures in the American literary canon, at least in the minds of the millions of school children forced to read "The Scarlet Letter." I will go so far as to admit I never finished that novel. I took one look through the book and laughed at the ridiculous idea of reading such a convoluted looking story. That was at age seventeen. Now, many years later I am able to go back and actually read some of these daunting novels. What is surprising is that they are not daunting at all, just written in an ornate style from a different age. The plots often deal with the same issues and concerns modern people fret about. For those uninterested in relationships and human dramas, there are also great old stories with supernatural elements, which is where this book comes in. This edition of the book includes an introduction by Mary Oliver and several commentaries on the work by Edwin Percy Whipple, Henry T. Tuckerman, F.O. Matthiessen, and Herman Melville. The Melville commentary is actually a letter the author of "Moby Dick" sent to Hawthorne where he concludes with a demand that Hawthorne "walk down one of these mornings and see me." Pretty neat.

In "The House of the Seven Gables," the author tells his reader the story is a romance. What he means by this terminology is not a cheap paperback that involves swooning hearts with Fabio on the cover, but "a legend prolonging itself, from an epoch now gray in the distance, down into our own broad daylight." Hawthorne's specific goal is to show that the bad behavior of one generation devolves on future descendents. He accomplishes this by examining the Pyncheon family, a clan founded on America's shores by the stern Puritan Colonel Pyncheon, who used his considerable influence to inveigle prime real estate from one Matthew Maule in the 17th century. Pyncheon carried out this task by using the Salem witchcraft scare to secure Maule's execution. In his last moments, Maule laid a curse on the good Colonel and all of his descendents, telling him that God would give them blood to drink as a punishment for this evil injustice. Shortly after the Colonel builds his house with seven gables on Maule's property, he dies in a way that makes Maule's curse seem to be a reality. Rather than trace this terrible evil down through the ages in minute detail, Hawthorne only touches on a few important points before beginning his story in the middle of the 19th century.

The Pyncheon family is slowly moldering into extinction when Hawthorne introduces us to poor old Hepzibah Pyncheon. She lives alone in the ancient estate, reduced to near starvation because her brother Clifford is in prison and Jaffrey Pyncheon, a rich judge who lives in his own manor in the country, refuses to offer her assistance. The only way to survive for Hepzibah is to open a penny store in an old part of the decaying house. Just when things reach a nadir, another Pyncheon turns up to save the day. This is Phoebe, a vivacious young lady who lives in the country. This fetching lass is a blessing for Hepzibah; she runs the penny store, helps to lift the gloomy atmosphere in the house, and when Clifford returns from his long imprisonment, Phoebe entertains the doddering man with her multitude of charms. She even strikes up an acquaintance with Holgrave, a young boarder in the house. Things start to look up when yet another tragedy strikes the Pyncheon family, leading to the momentary evacuation of the ancestral estate by Hepzibah and Clifford before Hawthorne settles all accounts in an ending that is both quick and highly implausible.

The reputation this book has with many people is not good. They disparage the lengthy digressions, the massive amount of time Hawthorne takes to explore Hepzibah's dilemma over opening the penny store, the sentences that go on and on without seeming to make any point whatsoever, and the organization of the book as a whole. There is some foundation in these charges. The chapters describing the penny store do seem interminable, especially when viewed in the context of the story as a whole. As for the descriptions of Hepzibah's scowling countenance and Clifford's puny mental state, we get the idea well before Hawthorne quits harping on them. Yes, there are flaws in "The House of the Seven Gables."

However, I personally enjoyed the deeply rich 19th century prose. Hawthorne's command of the English language is impressive and, at times, as precise as a cruise missile. One need only read the chapter about Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon's unfortunate incident in the house to grasp the beauty of this author's style. As for the digressions, if people have a problem with chapters such as "Alice Pyncheon" and the introductory material setting down the history of the doomed family, it is really their loss. It is when Hawthorne writes about supernatural elements that he really managed to grab me. If this counts as a lengthy digression from the story, I will take more, please!

If I had to assign a Hawthorne novel to a group of slack jawed high school students, I would give them this one in place of "The Scarlet Letter." At least with "The House of the Seven Gables," someone might enjoy the eerie curse that united the Maules with the Pyncheons for two centuries. A letter sewn on clothing cannot stack up against ghosts, a disembodied hand, and mysterious deaths. The kids will still grumble, but not as much when they realize there are less "thees" and "thous" tossed around in this novel.

It's very obvious from reading all of these reader reviews that The House of the Seven Gables is not for everyone. But, I urge you to determine if it is for you. If it is, you certainly don't want to miss it. This novel was not written with today's readers in mind. You cannot call it quick-paced, by any stretch of the imagination. The novel is however, a wonderful work of art. Every sentence, every word is carefully crafted, carefully chosen. This novel is meant to be read slowly, to be savored. The novel tells a fairly simple story--the story of the house, and its perhaps doomed family of inhabitants. Many years after a curse by a supposed warlock--there are only 4 members of the doomed family surviving. Is the house haunted? Maybe. Hawthorne is so clever--every time he tells us about a supposed ghost or haunting, he gives us a more "reasonable" explanation. Were they ghosts swirling around the house one evening, or was it just the wind. Is the family doomed? Maybe, but then there is young Pheobe who seems anything but. The House of Seven Gables is far superior to any contemporary gothic you can read. It is novel writing at its best. The characters have depth, the story is engaging, and even, at times, funny. But, you have to be ready for a novel written well over a hundred years ago. If you are, you are in for a treat.

I must say that the negative reviews that I have read about Nathaniel Hawthorne's The House of the Seven Gables are sorely off the mark. The prevalent sentiments are that the plot is dull (or almost absent), the characters are flat, and the description is overwrought. But you who say this are simply missing the point, as well as taking Hawthorne's work out of context. You have to understand that this novel was written during a very transitional period in literature. Writers had shifted from the Enlightenment to Romanticism (the period in which Hawthorne writes), and as Hawthorne writes his novels, another movement is being made to Realism. Realism is what we are used to in modern fiction. It contains real characters and real events. But Hawthorne had not yet fully employed these new ideas, and he still hung on to the Romantic sentiments. Therefore, he was much more interested in ideas rather than character development (a modern technique). Hawthorne chooses to convey ideas, emotions, morals, etc. rather than fully developed the characters like they would be in a novel today.

As for no plot, you have to keep in mind that Hawthorne still looks to the old tradition (not to mention his guilt of his heritage), so he uses his writing as a way to teach moral lessons, not necessarily to describe a highly detailed story and plot.

Finally, I can't deny that there is plenty of narrative description, but most of it serves a great purpose, and for the parts that you think do not belong, just read and enjoy them for their poetic beauty and technical merit.

Hawthorne is a fantastic writer, but to acknowledge this, the reader must not take his work out of its context.

"Half-way 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." And this solid and antique house contains many things - memories of those who lived and died there, and the terrible secrets that haunted those long dead, and haunt the living to this very day. This is the story of Hepzibah Pyncheon, an old maid who carries the weight of the past like a millstone about here neck; Clifford Pyncheon, whose past has left him a broken and haunted old man; Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon, a veritable echo of all that is good and bad in the Pyncheons; Phoebe Pyncheon, an unspoiled country cousin who finds herself sucked into the mysteries contain in the dark and sinister house; and finally Holgrave, a daguerreotypist and an outsider, perhaps the only one who truly knows the secrets of the House of the Seven Gables.

This is a classic of American literature, written in 1851, when railway trains were still a novel and exciting invention, when spiritualism was the rage, and when mesmerism had everyone...well, mesmerized. It was also a time when books came out slowly from the presses, and people expected long, flowing books that gave them more for their money and kept them entertained through the long pre-TV days. As such, it must be admitted that the modern criticism that the book is ponderous or slow-moving, does have some justification.

But, in spite of that, if you can keep at this book, you will find yourself rewarded with an extremely interesting story, a mystery set in a strange setting that is sure to keep you on the edge of your seat. I enjoyed reading the deep and winding plot, watching the mysteries unravel in a seemly inevitable manner, like doom itself. I really enjoyed this book, and don't hesitate to recommend it!

What can you say about Nathaniel Hawthorne's "House of the Seven Gables" that hasn't been said before? It's dark; it's Gothic; much of it is depressing; and the language is dense 19th century prose. Those who read primarily for plot will find it slow going, and those who look for likeable characters may be largely disappointed. In other words, for modern readers, this book may be a tough sell. Personally, I found it a little dull and a letdown after having recently reread (and enjoyed) "The Scarlet Letter."

Nonetheless, "The House of the Seven Gables" has its pleasures. Hawthorne, the scion of an old Massachusetts Puritan family, injects an unusual sense of historical depth into his writings. This is certainly true of "The House of the Seven Gables," which explores the idea of character flaws, evil and retribution passed down from generation to generation in a single family. Of course not everyone in the family is guilty, but the sins of a few taint the lives of all. As in much of Hawthorne's work, the supernatural, sometimes implied and sometimes explicit, plays a role in the workings of the plot. Even the daguerrotypist--nothing but an early photographer to us--must have given the 19th century reader a frisson because of his combination of mesmeric powers and miraculous ability to produce telling images out of pure light.

Hawthorne is a master of description, an expert at using his words to create images that convey far more than simple visuals. Even when the plot seemed stale and the characters wooden, the author's use of the language made it worth continuing. Hawthorne's descriptions of a little boy's love of animal-shaped cookies, of the garden with Maule's bitter well, and of the dead Jaffrey unmoving in his chair, to mention just a few, made the book well worth reading. "The House of the Seven Gables" may or may not be Hawthorne's best work (that's always a matter of opinion--try some of his short stories too), but it is an interesting book nonetheless

A slow, leisurely, and deep read. Hawthorne has a wonderful prose style that is uniquely him. He has a poetic way of taking things that seem small or insignificant and making them large and thoughtful. The plot does not move along quickly, but I found that the reading did. The characters seem to move in slow motion for a great majority of the book, and every movement has volumes of meaning. I feel this book is very representative of the emergence of american values of equality, of a disdain for the importance previously placed on pedigree or heritage and of course, of the emphasis on things like virtue, humility, etc. A delicious read.

This book is really good. Very deep mystery about a dying witch's curse. It's not a fast-moving thriller, by a slow and methodical one. Every word is chosen so carefully by Hawthorne, that it is fun to read and a challenge for the mind to find the hidden meaning. The novel starts with a discription of the house- the house with human attributes and ends with a lone cat watching the fulfillment of a witch's curse. Really excellent. There's plenty of characterization, hints of incest, and omenious surrounding to keep the reader entertained. Love love loved it, read it in a college American literature class.

Need mental exercise while entertaining yourself with a brilliant classic American author weaving a tale of ancestral guilt connected with a Gothic house of seven gables and a curse? Then consider this novel. Yes. Hawthorne needed an editor, but the dense prose can be skimmed if you so choose and the heart of a good story remains.

Hawthorne develops his characters in astonishing depth and detail focusing on physical, environmental and behavioral characteristics that reveal their souls to the reader in a way that modern writers don't have the patience or talent to achieve.

Readers may be put off by Hawthorne's excessive character detail and prefer to come to their own conclusions about his characters, but one can't help but be impressed with his impressive abilities and depth of thought.

If you're already read and enjoyed "The Scarlet Letter" consider this novel.

The House of the Seven Gables was a very intersting book, full of suspense, surprises, and even a little humor. Here is the basic plot: The story starts in 1692, when a man named Matthew Maule is hung for witchcraft by a vicious member of the Pyncheon family. Before he dies, though, Matthew screams, "God will give him blood to drink!" After the death of Maule, his property is acquired by the same Pyncheon who saw him to the gallows. This Pyncheon dies mysteriously at his house-warming party, and the curse of Maule sticks with the Pyncheons. The previously mentioned Pyncheon had a house(incidentally, with seven gables), which was eventually possessed by the main character, Hepzibah Pyncheon. Hepzibah must set up a cent shop to buy her bread, and her main customer is a hungry, gingerbread-purchasing little boy. Her load lightens with the arrival of her young cousin, Phoebe, but the plot thickens when Hepzibah's brother Clifford comes to stay. Her other cousin, the vile Judge Pyncheon, acts very oddly toward Clifford from the moment Clifford arrives. I won't tell you how the book ends, but I sure liked it, and I feel it proves that the evils of a family can be thwarted by a few members.

Many complain that Hawthorne's style is too turgid, too stilted and dense to be enjoyable. Admittedly, I was not that fond of The Scarlet Letter, though its merits probably rest beyond the attention spans of most people committed to reading it in lit class. As anyone will tell you, it takes supreme effort and time to wend through any Hawthorne book.

I found The House of the Seven Gables much more enjoyable, a novel more accessible to the casual reader than the Scarlet Letter, but still imposing and impressive and just a bit pompous, as anyone can say of the little Hawthorne they have read. The characterization is marvelous. The adumbration of Hepzibah's insular misery and Clifford's simple minded pariah-hood, and the reforming agent of Phoebe's love and rustic vivacity, as well as multiple other character sketches and glorious descriptive passages, are what carried me through this novel. Unlike in the Scarlet Letter, it seems as though the tedium (what little there is here) is always at some point made up for, as though Hawthorne was attempting to counterbalance certain dry passages with heavenly description and character revelations.

Those who detested the Scarlet Letter will likely find little but soporific tedium here; for those whose initiation into Hawthorne's craft was not overly harrowing, keep this one in mind for a rainy day.