The House of the Seven Gables film Wikipedia

house of seven gables

When the vehicle had disappeared, she allowedherself still another loitering moment; for the patched figure of good UncleVenner was now visible, coming slowly from the head of the street downward,with a rheumatic limp, because the east wind had got into his joints. Hepzibahwished that he would pass yet more slowly, and befriend her shivering solitudea little longer. Anything that would take her out of the grievous present, andinterpose human beings betwixt herself and what was nearest toher,—whatever would defer for an instant the inevitable errand on whichshe was bound,—all such impediments were welcome.

Secret Rooms Revealed At The House Of The Seven Gables - CBS Boston

Secret Rooms Revealed At The House Of The Seven Gables.

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At first, Hepzibah worries that Phoebe’s presence will upset Hepzibah’s brother, Clifford, who is returning home from prison. Phoebe’s charm and diligence prevail, however, and she finally convinces Hepzibah to let her stay. When Clifford returns, battered and almost imbecilic from his time in prison, he is quite impressed by Phoebe. Contrary to Hepzibah’s fears, Clifford is more bothered by their poverty than by her tending to a store. The novel is set in the mid-19th century, but flashbacks to the history of the house, which was built in the late 17th century, are set in other periods.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

—this veil, under which far more of his spirit was hidden thanrevealed, and through which he so imperfectly discerned the actualworld,—or was its gray texture woven of some dark calamity? Let theworld have done him what vast wrong it might, she knew Cousin Clifford toowell—or fancied so—ever to shudder at the touch of his thin,delicate fingers. Inhis last extremity, the expiring breath stealing faintly throughClifford’s lips, he would doubtless press Hepzibah’s hand, infervent recognition of all her lavished love, and close his eyes,—but notso much to die, as to be constrained to look no longer on her face! She took counsel with herself what might be done, and thought ofputting ribbons on her turban; but, by the instant rush of several guardianangels, was withheld from an experiment that could hardly have proved less thanfatal to the beloved object of her anxiety.

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For another half-hour, or, perhaps, considerably more, therewas almost as much quiet on the outside of the house as within. She shook it accordingly, and the bell, having a spiteful little temper of itsown, rang obstreperously, making its remonstrances heard,—not, indeed, bythe ears for which they were intended,—but by a good lady on the oppositeside of the street. Her face glowed with fire-heat, and,it being a pretty warm morning, she bubbled and hissed, as it were, as if alla-fry with chimney-warmth, and summer-warmth, and the warmth of her owncorpulent velocity. She tried it again,with so angry a jar that the bell tinkled angrily back at her.

house of seven gables

Clifford and Phœbe

Were these to be worthily recounted, theywould form a narrative of no small interest and instruction, and possessing,moreover, a certain remarkable unity, which might almost seem the result ofartistic arrangement. But the story would include a chain of events extendingover the better part of two centuries, and, written out with reasonableamplitude, would fill a bigger folio volume, or a longer series of duodecimos,than could prudently be appropriated to the annals of all New England during asimilar period. It consequently becomes imperative to make short work with mostof the traditionary lore of which the old Pyncheon House, otherwise known asthe House of the Seven Gables, has been the theme.

Clifford’s Chamber

Nor was it out of keeping with the general coarseness andmatter-of-fact character of the age, that the son should be willing to earn anhonest penny, or, rather, a weighty amount of sterling pounds, from the purseof his father’s deadly enemy. At all events, Thomas Maule became thearchitect of the House of the Seven Gables, and performed his duty sofaithfully that the timber framework fastened by his hands still holdstogether. When a writer calls his work a Romance, it need hardly be observed that hewishes to claim a certain latitude, both as to its fashion and material, whichhe would not have felt himself entitled to assume had he professed to bewriting a Novel.

house of seven gables

Gervayse wants to know the whereabouts of the deed to the Pyncheon land in Maine; its disappearance has an alleged connection with the Maules. Maule persuades Gervayse to let him hypnotize Alice; using her as a spiritual medium, he can then contact their respective ancestors in order to learn the deed’s location. In addition, Alice remains under Maule’s hypnotic spell for the rest of her life, forced to obey Maule’s wishes from afar. While reading this story, Holgrave inadvertently casts Phoebe into a slightly hypnotic state.

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In the growth of the town, however, after some thirty or fortyyears, the site covered by this rude hovel had become exceedingly desirable inthe eyes of a prominent and powerful personage, who asserted plausible claimsto the proprietorship of this and a large adjacent tract of land, on thestrength of a grant from the legislature. Colonel Pyncheon, the claimant, as wegather from whatever traits of him are preserved, was characterized by an ironenergy of purpose. Matthew Maule, on the other hand, though an obscure man, wasstubborn in the defence of what he considered his right; and, for severalyears, he succeeded in protecting the acre or two of earth which, with his owntoil, he had hewn out of the primeval forest, to be his garden ground andhomestead.

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There was something very beautiful in the relation that grew up between thispair, so closely and constantly linked together, yet with such a waste ofgloomy and mysterious years from his birthday to hers. On Clifford’s partit was the feeling of a man naturally endowed with the liveliest sensibility tofeminine influence, but who had never quaffed the cup of passionate love, andknew that it was now too late. He knew it, with the instinctive delicacy thathad survived his intellectual decay.

As for the bargain, it was wrinkled slyness andcraft pitted against native truth and sagacity. They now went below stairs, where Phœbe—not so much assuming the officeas attracting it to herself, by the magnetism of innate fitness—took themost active part in preparing breakfast. The mistress of the house, meanwhile,as is usual with persons of her stiff and unmalleable cast, stood mostly aside;willing to lend her aid, yet conscious that her natural inaptitude would belikely to impede the business in hand.

At a little distance stood a woodenchurch, black with age, and in a dismal state of ruin and decay, with brokenwindows, a great rift through the main body of the edifice, and a rafterdangling from the top of the square tower. Farther off was a farm-house, in theold style, as venerably black as the church, with a roof sloping downward fromthe three-story peak, to within a man’s height of the ground. There were the relics of a wood-pile, indeed, near the door, butwith grass sprouting up among the chips and scattered logs. The smallrain-drops came down aslant; the wind was not turbulent, but sullen, and fullof chilly moisture. Fast and far asthey had rattled and clattered along the iron track, they might just as well,as regarded Hepzibah’s mental images, have been passing up and downPyncheon Street.

But no soonerwas she a little relieved than her conscience smote her for gazing curiously athim, now that he was so changed; and, turning hastily away, Hepzibah let downthe curtain over the sunny window, and left Clifford to slumber there. But the several moods of feeling, faintly as they were marked, through which hehad passed, occurring in so brief an interval of time, had evidently weariedthe stranger. If aught ofinterest or beauty—even ruined beauty—had heretofore been visiblein this man, the beholder might now begin to doubt it, and to accuse his ownimagination of deluding him with whatever grace had flickered over that visage,and whatever exquisite lustre had gleamed in those filmy eyes. Phœbe recognizedit as the same which had passed upward, as through her dream, in thenight-time.

Old homes in the Hudson Valley - Times Union

Old homes in the Hudson Valley.

Posted: Fri, 23 Jun 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]

To the thoughtful mind there will be no tinge ofsuperstition in what we figuratively express, by affirming that the ghost of adead progenitor—perhaps as a portion of his own punishment—is oftendoomed to become the Evil Genius of his family. Nevertheless, creeping darkly through the places which this excellent personhad haunted in his lifetime, there was a hidden stream of private talk, such asit would have shocked all decency to speak loudly at the street-corners. It isvery singular, how the fact of a man’s death often seems to give people atruer idea of his character, whether for good or evil, than they have everpossessed while he was living and acting among them. Death is so genuine a factthat it excludes falsehood, or betrays its emptiness; it is a touchstone thatproves the gold, and dishonors the baser metal. Could the departed, whoever hemay be, return in a week after his decease, he would almost invariably findhimself at a higher or lower point than he had formerly occupied, on the scaleof public appreciation. But the talk, or scandal, to which we now allude, hadreference to matters of no less old a date than the supposed murder, thirty orforty years ago, of the late Judge Pyncheon’s uncle.

Many writers lay very great stress upon some definite moral purpose, at whichthey profess to aim their works. In goodfaith, however, he is not sufficiently imaginative to flatter himself with theslightest hope of this kind. When romances do really teach anything, or produceany effective operation, it is usually through a far more subtile process thanthe ostensible one. The author has considered it hardly worth his while,therefore, relentlessly to impale the story with its moral as with an ironrod,—or, rather, as by sticking a pin through a butterfly,—thus atonce depriving it of life, and causing it to stiffen in an ungainly andunnatural attitude.

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