The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars Fine Psychological Supernatural Horror Dr. John Montague has rented Hill House for three summer months, because it is isolated (the closest people live six miles away) and reputed to be haunted. He's out to conduct a scientific investigation of the paranormal there for a book that should knock the socks off his peers. To accomplish this, he’ll need "assistants" to corroborate (if not to catalyze) supernatural phenomena, so he's sent invitations to people with relevant experience. Two agree to participate. First comes Eleanor Vance, a self-conscious, friendless, unfulfilled, sensitive, and highly imaginative 32-year-old virgin--imagine an Anne Shirley who never met Diana Barry or Gilbert Blythe! When Eleanor was twelve, her father died and for three days stones fell from the sky on the family house. She has spent the last eleven years of her life taking care of her invalid mother, and now that the woman has died Eleanor is a free agent (though her unpleasant big sister and brother-in-law sure don't want her driving the family car). Second to arrive is the vivacious shopkeeper Theodora, who lives in a world of "delight and soft colors" and once laughingly broke a laboratory's record for identifying hidden playing cards. She's at liberty because she recently had a terrible fight with her roommate climaxing in the destruction of the gifts they had received from each other. Joining them in Hill House is Luke Sanderson, a wealthy and rakish young man due to inherit the pile. His aunt figures that she's gotten "the liar and thief" out of trouble for the summer by forcing him on Dr. Montague. As soon as Eleanor arrives at Hill House she senses that "it was . . . not a fit place for people or for love or for hope" and hears "the sick voice inside her which whispered, Get away from here, get away." Instead of following that advice, she musters all her "moral strength" and, repeating the lines of a song, "journeys end in lovers meeting," steps onto the veranda of Hill House. There she is "enshadowed" by the house, which she feels "was waiting for her, evil, but patient." If you don't like horror stories in which people do stupid things like enter obviously inimical houses … As the other participants show up at Hill House, and Dr. Montague recounts its history and legends, and inexplicable and disturbing things begin happening there, we realize that Eleanor is the worst person in the worst place at the worst time (or the best person in the best place at the best time). Where will it all end? Are they dealing with one ghost or multiple ghosts or a sentient house or all these? Why is the space before the nursery so abnormally cold? Why can't Eleanor enter the tower and its library? What do the house and or its ghost(s) want with her? What does she want with them? Is it all in her head? It can't be, because Theodora, Luke, and Dr. Montague all perceive many of the same supernatural manifestations as Eleanor. And yet… In The Haunting of Hill House (1959) Shirley Jackson excels at psychological horror, putting complicated people in situations attuned to their needs and weaknesses. The book has interesting things to say about fear, as well as about loneliness and the limits of friendship in stressful contexts. She unveils our unflattering impulses, as when we experience a momentary desire to physically or verbally slap someone we really like. She's very aware of how and why groups turn on weaker members. She's also very funny: even before the comedy relief entrance of Mrs. Montague and her right hand man the schoolmaster Arthur, who believe themselves to be supremely sensitive to the supernatural while remaining pompously oblivious, Luke, Theodora, and Eleanor often engage in witty whistling in the dark repartee and flights of fancy. The reader of the audiobook, Bernadette Dunne, gives a fine reading, although perhaps her male voices tend to sound the same. I've never forgotten watching the first movie adaptation, The Haunting (1963), when I was nine, because the part where Julie Harris as Eleanor holds what she thinks is Theodora's hand for comfort terrified me into a night of wakefulness with bedroom lights on. So I was curious to find out what the original novel would do to my middle-aged self. I found it to be more morbidly fascinating, ambiguous, and sad than scary. Instead of writing scenes of sensational and graphic violence ala Hellraiser et al, Jackson makes us care about the emotional and mental distress of her main characters. Eleanor is so pathetic in her yearning to belong and so sensitive and imaginative that it's hard to draw the line between what she wants and what Hill House wants. I recommend the book to people who like well-written psychological supernatural horror without graphic violence, expensive special effects, complete explanations, or happy endings. View all my reviews
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