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Tate Wood

Mrs. Norton

AP Language and Composition

September 30, 2016

Literary Analysis of The House of Seven Gables (Revised Version)

The House of Seven Gables, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is a story of an aging,

decrepit house that is soon going to have visitors. Those visitors are Hepzibah Pyncheon, an old

maid and her brother Clifford, who is about to be released from prison. Clifford is going to be

going under the care of Hepzibah while they reside in this house of seven gables. Throughout

this story, Hawthorne establishes a very strong message. He even directly states this in the

preface of the novel. The wrong-doing of one generation lives into the successive ones, and,

divesting itself of every temporary advantage, becomes a pure and uncontrollable

mischief, (Hawthorne 2). This is the common theme throughout the novel portrayed through the

dialogue of characters but more importantly the actions of the characters.

This common theme put across in The House of Seven Gables is essentially universal.

The cultural context of the time period of the book didn't have a huge impact with affecting the

time that the novel was published as it was published about a century and a half later in 1851.

However, the message of the book is still important regardless because it leads to thinking about
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how people as a generation will affect the next and even further after that with proceeding

generations. Moreover, a message with no purpose is not a message at all.

The purpose of the common theme throughout the novel is to make readers aware that the

behaviors of past generations influence the future generations to come after. He wants to make

people realize their actions and how they will change the world in which their children will live.

He expresses this through out the novel by having the previous generations of the Pyncheon's

give a glorious name to be living up to for the current generation in the novel. By doing this, he

adds support to his message of the generations having a strong influential impact on the next.

After reading The House of Seven Gables, it is evident that Nathaniel Hawthorne

successfully put across the message he was intending to portray. He also certainly proved that

the wrong-doing of one generation lives into the successive ones done through his

development of characters throughout the entirety of the novel (Hawthorne 2). This was done

through the important actions of characters and showing the repercussions that became reality to

them. (398 words)