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The Lovely House
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“The Lovely House” is a short story written by American author Shirley Jackson. Better known for some of her other works The Lottery and The Haunting of Hill House, “The Lovely House” still doesn’t fail to intrigue the reader with its ambiguities, coincidences, and symbolism. Although it is up to the reader to decide in the end whether or not it is a ghost story, in “The Lovely House” Jackson remains true to her classic Gothic style. Plot Summary Part I: A young girl named Margaret goes to spend a visit at her school friend Carla Montague’s magnificent house. When she first arrives, she is amazed at how grand everything seems, and she frequently comments to herself how lovely she thinks it is. Margaret meets Carla’s mother, who is frequently at work on her needlepoint. After exploring the house a little bit, Margaret sees that the house is full of tapestries, all of which are different depictions of the house that they are in. Carla explains that the tapestries were all made by her mother, her grandmother, her great-grandmother, and her great-great-grandmother, leading the reader to believe the Montague family has lived in the house for a very long time. Carla continues to give Margaret a tour of the house, showing her a variety of unique rooms, each containing tapestries of the house. Carla mentions a tower in the house in passing, and Margaret becomes instantly intrigued by the idea. However, Carla doesn’t comment on it again. Later Margaret and Carla have dinner with Mr. and Mrs. Montague, and afterwards Mrs. Montague shows Margaret a tiled room where the tiles make up a mosaic of the house. Margaret becomes interested in a picture next to the house of a girl’s face with an inscription below it that reads ‘Here was Margaret who died for love.’ Part II: Margaret’s brother comes to visit, along with his friend a captain, and Carla’s brother introduces himself to Margaret as Paul. The two boys and two girls spend a lot of time together partaking in various activities and games. Margaret becomes increasingly closer and closer to Paul and enjoys talking to him, much to the dismay of Carla, who acts and says odd things to Margaret whenever she is talking with Paul. Later Margaret is walking by a river that surrounds the house and talking with Paul, and she asks him about the tower, since it seems that no one else will talk about it with her. He tells her that there is a woman that spends time in there but never comes down because she cannot stand the sight of the tapestries. Margaret later makes up her mind to go see the tower, and climbs the stairs to a heavy oak door. She knocks and is allowed to enter, where she meets the old woman, who is also named Margaret. Both Margaret’s talk about Paul, but the older Margaret seems awfully anxious for him to leave the house. Part III: The Montagues have a formal ball and Margaret is dancing with Paul when he notices the old lady walking toward them. Paul and the old lady become engrossed in conversation and the captain walks up to Margaret and asks her to dance. While dancing, they talk of his and Paul’s departure the next day, and Margaret feels she will miss them after they have gone. The next day the captain and Paul prepare to leave, but before they leave the captain reproaches Mr. and Mrs. Montague for several instances of disrepair in the house. They tell him it’s wrong for him to notice the problems with the house and ignore its nice qualities, and the captain becomes angry. Margaret goes to verify these problems in the house, and tells Paul that there really are things that need to be fixed. Paul becomes very angry and tells her that things can’t be fixed and replaced, they can only be added to. They hear the rest of the family coming down the stair and Paul tells Margaret goodbye and leaves. Margaret then meets with the rest of the family and discovers that it is the captain that is Carla’s brother, not Paul, which makes her wonder who Paul was supposed to be. Mrs. Montague then has Carla and Margaret sit on the lawn as models for her to finish her embroidery. Analysis There are many devices at work in “The Lovely House”, but what is perhaps most notable is the use of the house as a Gothic trope. Everything that the characters do and say revolves around the house. The house is decorated with pictures of itself, and the main priority of everyone in the house is to take care of and love and admire the house. They seem to never want to leave the house and shudder at the suggestion of replacing any part of the house. They refuse to "restore" the house and insist that they can only add to the house. The house is a prison in this story too, only it seems that the characters have no desire to escape from it. Examples of other notable devices: The first time that Margaret meets Mrs. Montague, Mrs. Montague is described as "a tall lady wearing pale green and pale blue". In the very next paragraph, Margaret looks around the room that they are standing in and the room is described as "a pale green and a pale blue long room with tall windows". Since the description of both the woman and the room are exactly the same, this suggests that perhaps Mrs. Montague is either one with the house or is actually a part of the house. Throughout the story when any of the characters other than Margaret speak, they often emphasize strange words (as is shown in the words that are italicized). Margaret only emphasizes her words once throughout the entire story, and that is when she is looking at the mosaic of Margaret Who Died For Love. She says "What is this?" And stood back to see, and then knelt down and said, "What is this?" Carla says "When my brother comes" at least a hundred times in the story, suggesting that the family can’t really live without the brother and only really come alive when he is there. Carla always says the strangest things to Margaret whenever she is with Paul, and this doesn’t make sense until the reader learns at the end that Paul doesn't really exist. Carla tells Margaret "you say odd things, sometimes" and when Margaret is going to see the rose garden Carla says "Where are you off to now, Margaret? ...You are really very odd, sometimes. Later, when they are having a picnic, Margaret gets up to go see the river with Paul and Carla says "Margaret, you are ALWAYS wandering off." A lot of passages like this exist in the story and they only make sense when read a second time. For instance, when they are playing croquet and Paul hits Margaret's ball toward a wicket and the captain accuses her of cheating; now that the reader knows Paul doesn't exist, it must've been Margaret taking two turns and hitting her own ball toward the wicket. Later, when they are playing word games, Margaret and Paul win and everyone says that "Margaret is so clever"; If Paul wasn't there, then Margaret must've won on her own, making her victory more impressive Whenever Margaret mentions the tower to Carla, Carla either completely ignores her or acts is if she hadn't said anything about the tower and continues talking about whatever it was that she was talking about before the question was asked. Paul is the only one that will talk about the tower and the old lady that is inside it, and Paul is the only one that the old lady speaks to besides Margaret. At the end of the story Mrs. Montague says to Margaret "I saw you one day try the door of the ruined tower." The reader knows the old lady is also named Margaret, and perhaps it is she who is the one in the mosaic who died for love, and maybe Paul is her lover, which would explain why they were laughing and reminiscing at the ball. If the tower is ruined, perhaps that was the cause of the old woman’s death. The only decorations inside the house are tapestries depicting the house that they are inside. This gives the illusion that the house is inescapable, because no matter where they go, there is always the house or a picture of the house. When Margaret goes into the mirror room she is frightened because the room looks infinite and she can't tell really how big or how small it is or where it ends or where it begins. The mirror room really represents the entire house, because the house is mirrored over and over in all of the tapestries that are hanging on the walls. It can be concluded that the house exists outside of the rest of the world and that it is inescapable and infinite. When Carla asks Margaret to come sit with her out on the lawn for her mother's tapestry that she is making, perhaps that means they are all just part of a giant tapestry that is hanging on the walls of an even bigger house that is being reflected into itself infinitely many times. Critical Analysis On December 29, 1996 Joyce Carol Oates wrote an article about Shirley Jackson entitled “Distressing Signals” for The New York Times. In the article she mentions “The Lovely House” and describes it as “poetic” and “Deeper, more mysterious and more disturbing than ‘The Lottery’”. Shirley Jackson and Dylan Thomas In the article about Dylan Thomas it mentions that American author Shirley Jackson met Thomas once briefly in her family home and, while accounts of their meeting vary, Shirley was allegedly deeply affected by the encounter. She wrote several short stories dedicated to and loosely based around Thomas. Only one of these short stories, "The Lovely House", was published during Jackson's lifetime. 
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