The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

When it comes to the horror genre there isn’t much that frightens me these day. I’m not sure why this is the case, but have a feeling it has something to do with my total immersion into the horror genre. Ironically, the reason for this immersion was because I loved being terrified in a safe environment, my mind always looking back with fondness at those nights where I watched things like Halloween, Friday the 13th, The Blob, Silver Bullet and Invasion of the Body Snatchers, or read things like Darkfall, Ticktock and Servants of Twilight by Dean Koontz, or Pet Sematary, ’Salem’s Lot and Misery by Stephen King, or the dozen or so tales by my grandma, Betty Smith, who took great pleasure it scaring the living daylights out of her grandchildren. It was a sensation I couldn’t get enough of back then; yet sadly is one that I almost never find myself enjoying these days. The only exception to this is if I see or read a well done story about a haunted house. For reasons I can’t explain haunted houses overwhelm me with terror and make it very difficult for me to get to sleep at night, especially now given the certainty that the house I live in is haunted. Two movies stand out when thinking about this, both of which I can’t watch at my place when alone even though I’ve seen them more times than I can count. They are The Haunting (1963) and The Changeling (1980 ). Just thinking about them now gives me the chills, as does my masochistic determination to watch them one night before this Halloween season is over. I will do it. I also sat down with The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, the book that inspired The Haunting, and read it, my self imposed rules stating I could only read at night on the couch by my window, one that almost can see the old graveyard down the street from me.

The Haunting of Hill house is the story of four people who determine to spend the summer season living in Hill House, an abandoned Victorian mansion that has stood for eighty years in the wooded valleys of the New England countryside. Dr. Montague, a scholar who is fascinated by the occult and hopes to bring more understanding of it to the scientific community, wants his team to live in the house and document their experiences. One of the people he brings into this quest is a young woman named Eleanor who once experienced an interesting supernatural phenomenon as a child, one that saw rocks falling from the sky onto her family’s home for several days. Unfortunately it seems Eleanor isn’t quite right in the head, her years of taking care of her overbearing dying mother having taken a terrible toll. Socially awkward, yet determined to fit in and be liked by everyone she encounters, Eleanor heads to Hill House despite her sister’s insistence that she stay home, and quickly becomes the focus of the house’s ill will. Her three companions experience the house’s spooky atmosphere as well, but in a way that is more generalized then Eleanor’s experiences. Adding to the confusion is the way the house was built. Walls and doors were set at a slight angle, the former making it so that the rooms don’t appear where one would think they would be, the latter making it so doors refuse to say open -- though sometimes they do stay open just long enough for the guests to watch them slam shut, almost as if the house wants them to see such moments. Noises frequently appear as well, especially at night, ones that only allow themselves to be heard by selected members of the team, Eleanor always being one of the selected. Fortunately nothing all that dangerous happens, the only exception being a moment when Eleanor nearly falls off a balcony from leaning over it to see the tower above, and for a while it seems as if the house is merely toying with them. All this changes when Dr. Montague’s wife shows up and tries to force the house’s spirits into submission with her various supernatural tools, her goal being to help them rid themselves of whatever horror is keeping them earth bound. Such actions are not wanted, however, and soon the house seems to change its focus from being hauntingly playful to one of serious terror. It also may not let everyone leave when they chose to do so.

As desired, the novel The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson did send chills through my body while reading it, but in a way this had more to do with my mind bringing up scenes from the 1963 movie rather than self created scenes from the text. Because of this I have to wonder if the novel would have frightened me on its own had I never seen the movie. It is a question I can not answer, yet one I like to think would have a yes attached to it because the book is pretty creepy. It is also very well written and moves along at a nice pace. The only exception to this, in my opinion, is the dialogue. At times it seems too perfect and scholarly. Some might say this has to do with the time period that the book was written, and while that may be true for some of the spoken lines, there are many that just didn’t feel right. I couldn’t picture people in that situation talking the way that they were, and every time this happened the realism of the book was momentarily destroyed. Thankfully this didn’t ruin the overall story for me, and I do highly recommend it to horror fans, if, that is, they haven’t already read the book. I also now hope to get my hands on Shirley Jackson’s other works, the most sought after one being We Have Always Lived in the Castle. Everyone I have talked to says it is an excellent read, and may be Shirley Jackson’s best piece of fiction. Until then I would love to hear reader’s thoughts on The Haunting of Hill House. Did the book frighten you? Was it an enjoyable read? Please don’t be shy.