Bought for $4 on June 30, 2021 after reading The Haunting of Hill House and while on a Shirley Jackson jag to compare with American short stories by Bret Harte and Mark Twain in an Osher class with David Walton. Read this one in September 2023 for the Second Foundation discussion on October 8, and again in September 2025 for the Beam Me Up book club on October 3.
This is Jackson’s final novel, published in 1962, before she died in 1965 at the all too tragic age of 48. This is a short book for complete misanthropes, or those who are constantly paranoid and looking over their shoulders. While billed as a bit of a mystery novel, this is really a work of literary fiction — a book that burrows deeper and deeper into the concept of what makes isolation as it goes along, and is richly marvelous, though also a summer’s breeze of a read (despite Jackson’s insistent use of semi-colons). It is a semi-autobiographical tale, and the first chapter of the book bears this out….
https://zachary-houle.medium.com/a-review-of-shirley-jacksons-we-have-always-lived-in-the-castle-7640f9c5699a
My review notes:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4161080302
Great writing, with a nightmarish atmosphere coupled with splashes of a clear and macabre humor (e.g, ‘there are some grounds for supposing you an undutiful daughter’). Brilliantly constructed, with a post-modern touch of time and psychic disorientation / disassociation.
Pay attention to the semi-colons; the lovely, lovely semi-colons. Every sentence has its beauty.
Horror atmosphere, like Blake Crouch or Stephen King.
Mash-up of genre: Gothic horror, psychological thriller, murder mystery, comedy of manners, domestic dysfunction, rural gossip and unkindness, the good doctor, evil (or perceived evil - it’s really just people being people, often cruel, sometimes wicked, occasionally kind).
Toward the end, ch.8, the childish but hurtful vandalism of the townspeople resonated with my youthful thoughtless escapades in a couple of abandoned and building in-process mansions.
QUESTIONS:
- Where does this take place? And when? She “remembers.” Time and place. Does it even matter?
- What happened 6 years ago? And 5 months ago?
- Why was MK sent to bed without dinner on the fateful night? Was she always schizo-affective and therefore difficult to deal with?
- What are the mental illnesses of the Blackwoods, surviving and dead? Do we know enough to guess? MK certainly, but Constance? Julian? Mom and Dad?
- What did Merricat think about the people she killed? Why?
“Always” is a sort of catchphrase, with 117 appearances: always did, always said, always have, etc. Routine ‘always’ provides stability and comfort.
The trial and evidence, ch. 2. Everyone knows she’s guilty, e.g., “I cannot seem to remember that that pretty young girl is actually—well.” But knowledge is not proof beyond a reasonable doubt, and circumstantial evidence is not enough to convict. Plus statements (it’s my fault, and those people deserved to die) that can be explained.
FEAR afraid 6, 7,
Mushrooms 1, 73, 90,
The accretion of repeated detail is very powerfully tense and creepy. Neatening, routines, the moon, Charles’s encroachment,
Sheer paranoia with aggressive tendencies (thoughts). Thinks everyone is looking at and talking about her. Solipsism. Of course, she may be right!
Hallucinatory psychosis, e.g., “when she put on a bright print dress it stayed looking bright for a little while before it merged into the dirty grey of the rest.” 11; “the false glorious promises of spring were everywhere, showing oddly through the village grime” 2
Dissociation: retreat to a house on the moon 14
the moon as a safe and comfortable place ; shelter / hiding place
MONEY 22, 47-48, 102, 142,
I love Merricat’s perceptions of others’ thoughts and feelings, especially Constance; and Jonas e.g.,113
“She likes to bury things.” p. 88
MK only “allowed” to do certain things 20, 24, 37, 39,
Are the rules imposed, or her own? Cf. “I decided that from now on I would not be allowed to hand tea cups.” 112. I think she decides what she’s allowed to do. 145 Part of her “arranged pattern” of living.127, 139
Safeguards and warding, shades of my nephew Christopher, with schizo-affective disorder, xx, 41, 70 books are strongly protective, buried objects , objects belonging to another
Is the creek there when I am not? 75. Do the stars shine when no one is there to look? Eve in P.L.
Merricat’s magical system is complicated yet intelligible. E.g., 76,
MK's solipsism sometimes borders on the psychotic (seeing people die and dead; killing people and stomping on their bodies - villagers p. 9 and Charles p. 80), and often on fantasy (e,g., p. 95, “on the moon” 27 times)
Also shades of Dustin Hoffman, autistic savant in Rain Man. E.g., p. 112 Need for patterns
OCD - Checking and re-checking the doors, cleaning and re-cleaning the floors, routines and constants
MK often wishes people are dead, 8, 10, 11, 16, 56, 57, 79, 80, 89,
MK wants to be kinder to Uncle Julian 12, 20, 26, 43, 81, 91, Why? Because he was almost murdered too?
He shows us how others would see them. E.g., 80,
Why do the sisters not take action when Charles is mean to Uncle Julian? E.g., 71, 81,
Punishment is a trigger, 94,
The house has vibes of Hill House 78, 97,
How to clean out the house 97, 98,
MK takes things literally, 125
Sometimes MK is deliberately fantastical, 135, 147
Dignity - Julian’s 91; invulnerable 126; of expectations 139
Stella and Mrs. Clark try gently to be human toward them, but Charles tries to run them and control them. Because he’s a man? Is greedy? And controlling? Or just practical? Question.
Constance is changed by Charles - as if HE casts a spell that is more powerful than Merricat’s. Under his spell, Constance imagines that she can live a normal life - but what of Merricat? And is Constance accurate? Or just wishful? When Merricat breaks the watch, “one thing, at least, had been released from Charles’ spell.” p. 87
>> By page 85, Merricat knows what’s coming if she doesn’t ACT.
The fire scene, ch. 8, is quite exciting.
The sisters find their happy place, 3 times before the fire, 7 times after: ‘very happy’ ‘so happy’
Preserve Julian’s papers, 134, wear uncle Julian’s skins, Merricat wears the skins of the past 137.
Note western Pennsylvania’s scariest house:
https://triblive.com/aande/movies-tv/tv-talk-western-pa-mansion-profiled-on-hgtvs-scariest-house-wpxi-reporter-exits/
