The House of the Seven Gables (Masterplots, Revised Second Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Nathaniel Hawthorne
- First Published: 1851
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Gothic
- Time of Work: 1850
- Setting: Salem, Massachusetts
- Principal Characters: Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon, Clifford Pyncheon, Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon, Phoebe Pyncheon, Mr. Holgrave
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction, Gothic fiction
- Subjects: Love or romance, Murder or homicide, Superstition, Nineteenth century, Brothers and sisters, New England, Good and evil, Inheritance or succession, Greed, Judges
- Locales: Salem, MA
The Story:
The House of the Seven Gables was a colonial house built in the English style of half-timber and half-plaster. It stood on Pyncheon Street in quiet Salem. The house had been built by Colonel Pyncheon, who had wrested the desirable site from Matthew Maule, a poor man executed as a wizard. Colonel Pyncheon was responsible for the execution, and he was taking the doomed man’s land, so Maule, at the moment of his execution, declared that God would give the Pyncheons blood to drink. Despite this grim prophecy, the colonel had his house, and its builder was Thomas Maule,...
[The entire page is 2486 words long]
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