In Woolf's short story "A Haunted House," the author explores the permanence of love through the existence of the two ghosts. Unlike conventional ghost stories, the ghosts of the dead couple are not scary. In fact, as the story progresses, the reader is drawn into the narrative, wondering just what the ghosts continue to search for. It is finally revealed that the ghostly couple's treasure is that of love, and that love has been kept "safe, safe, safe" within the house.
The living couple, who now inhabit the house, know that the ghosts are searching for something . In fact, "from room to room they went, hand in hand, lifting here, opening there, making sure—a ghostly couple." As the ghostly couple re-visits their house, they comment on the places where they kissed and slept. The house repeats, "Safe, safe, safe"; their love has been kept safe within its...
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walls. The permanence of their love is revealed at the story's end:
"Here we left our treasure—" Stooping, their light lifts the lids upon my eyes. “Safe! safe! safe!” the pulse of the house beats wildly. Waking, I cry, “Oh, is this your buried treasure? The light in the heart."
Through giving the house a voice using personification, Woolf emphasizes the permanence of love, as the ghostly couple's love is encased within the walls of the house and kept safe throughout eternity. True, everlasting love is the buried treasure.
In Virginia Woolf's story "The Haunted House," the narrator is the new resident in the house. She is telling about the ghosts who are roaming the house seeking their "treasure" no matter what time they awaken. They do not indicate that they are awakened by anything specifically. In fact, the narrator says that it is not the ghosts that wake them. This story is about being at home and being loved and safe in your home. The remark about the "Safe, Safe Safe" description is personification. Woolf is telling the reader that the home is safe and when you walk through the door you feel the breath of the house whispering that you are safe. The stream of consciousness manner in which Woolf writes this story draws the reader into the mind and soul of the narrator as we are also drawn into the home that the spirits are drawn to night after night.