Shirley Jackson’s Haunting in Hill House has always been one of my favorite novels. I can trace my love of dark, creepy things, supernatural occurrences, and ghost stories to her and her wonderful stories. And Hill House is one of the works that speaks to me the most because of the contradictory fragility of Eleanor.
As Eleanor travels to Hill House, finding the courage to steal the car she shares with her sister to get there, she indulges in many fantasies. Each one of these fantasies involves Eleanor being alone, being walled away from society in her fairy tale world guarded by stone lions and hidden behind magical oleander. Yet when she arrives at Hill House, though she is intimidated by its creepy facade, she feels as if she has come home. During her time in Hill House, she half-heartedly crushes on Luke and forms a friendship with mercurial Theo. Despite these connections, she doesn’t seem to like either person very much even though she expresses desire to follow Theo home and help her in her shop.
Eleanor’s attraction and repulsion of those that surround her are traits I often attribute to introverts. The dark thoughts are when the person desires to be alone, to be allowed to do their own thing with no one else laying a claim to their time. And yet, deep down, the introvert still desires to be near people, wants to spend time with others of a similar mind and interests so they know they are not as alone as they often crave to be. Eleanor wanted to be free of her mother’s needs and her sister’s often selfish demands, and yet at the same time, she wanted to be needed and to find a place where she belonged. Hill House, despite all the phenomena experienced within its walls, offers this sanctuary to her.
Perhaps Hill House is not the Eden she desires. The fragile nature of her mind and her fanciful wanderings leave the reader unable to tell whether she is insane and self-obsessed or if the house has truly been waiting for her all this time. Did she write her name on the wall? Did she vandalize Theo’s clothes and paint graffiti in blood in the green room? I always felt that Eleanor was a lonely, lost woman who, after having given up her life to take care of her family, has lost her way and has no idea who she is. When faced with strong personalities, such as Theo’s, Eleanor cannot help but cling to dark thoughts while trying to find a way to entrench herself more firmly in Theo’s life because she has no life of her own.
As Eleanor is forced to leave Hill House, she can’t take it, to be forced away from a place she was wanted and welcomed. All she desires is to stay, and if the only means by which to accomplish this is her death, then so be it. Now, she will remain forever in Hill House with the ghosts that so obviously wanted her. She no longer has to be alone.
Ramblings of Jhenry 