Though sinister Merricat narrates Shirley Jackson's macabre novel, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, it was gentle Constance who left me wondering. Merricat fantasizes about kicking her neighbor while she's dying and burying her cousin's head in a hole, so I felt confident in calling her evil.Constance, though, was harder for me to grasp. She seemed sweet, and I thought perhaps she was the fragile prisoner of her sister's obsession, but then she made a comment about cooking a child, and I was thrown off. As seen through the eyes of unreliable Merricat, Constance was wonderful and worthy of adoration, but I got the impression that, if told by a third-person, she wouldn't seem such a delicate flower after all.
The Blackwood sisters have always lived in the castle, and it is apparent that they always will. Six years ago, they lived with their family. Then they lived with their uncle. Now they live alone. Accident? Hmm. Jackson effectively created characters that were at once intriguing and repulsive. I wanted to know more, and yet I couldn't wait to get away from them. Which is exactly what I was supposed to feel, I think.
10 comments:
I've been wanting to read this one for years and that's the edition I saw once in a bookstore and hope to get someday. It just sounds highly original!
The cover is totally creepy and it sounds like the book is too.
This is one of my favorite books. I think Jackson is masterful at creating characters that seem so normal and at the same time capable of true evil. If you haven't read her short story, The Lottery, I highly recommend it.
Deliciously creepy!
I've only read The Lottery, but this cover is so creepy, that I might have to add it to my list.
Love this book. Great review!
The cover art certainly is creepy- sounds like it's probably a good reflection of the book as well!
I have this one in my TBR pile and am really looking forward to it. It's been getting good reviews all over the blogosphere, which I think is a good sign. Your review has piqued my interest yet again, so I think I'll need to bump this one up the queue. I love a creepy read...
I just finished this book today and immediately went online to see what other people thought of it. I absolutely loved it, and I have a feeling Shirley Jackson is going to be one of my favorite authors (I just picked up The Haunting of Hill House as well).
In regards to Merricat being evil, I would have to say I found the villagers surrounding the house much more vile and repugnant than the two girls. But this could be only because the book was written in first person and I always find first person narratives make the protagonist more sympathetic.
Again though, I loved this book!
I viewed Merricat more as amoral than evil: she could not tell the difference between right and wrong. To her, what was right was what felt right and what was wrong was what felt wrong: a very immature, childlike way of viewing good and evil. Jackson's genius is bringing out the humanity of such a character that most would find repulsive and impossible to understand. In fact, I thought that the character was extremely sympathetic: but I am probably biased. As a child I was very much like Merricat (thankfully minus the violent impulses.)I first read the book at age 11, and felt I was almost looking into a mirror, more so than any character in any book I have read.
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