Biblio Beau

Thursday, April 22, 2010

31.

Author: Shirley Jackson
Title: We Have Always Lived in the Castle
Publication: Paperback, 2006
Pages: 146 pages
Genre: Horror
Acquisition: Purchased April 16, 2010, Recommended by laytonwoman3rd
Date Completed: April 22, 2010
Rating: 5 stars out of 5

We Have Always Lived in the Castle is the story of the reclusive remnants of a wealthy family that died mysteriously before the narrative begins. Mary Katherine, Constance, and their Uncle Julian are all that survive, and Merricat does everything she can to protect her older sister from the world. Shirley Jackson's short novel is haunting and thrilling, and she masterfully creates tension and horror without resorting to trite themes of slash and gore. We Have Always Lived in the Castle is terrifying for its simplicity and honesty, and although the primary mystery is evident from very early the story itself is thoroughly engaging.

I highly highly recommend We Have Always Lived in the Castle, even for those who do not normally enjoy horror novels. Jackson is an exception worth making.

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"To tell people what to read is, as a rule, either useless or harmful; for the appreciation of literature is a question of temperament not of teaching [...]. But to tell people what not to read is a very different matter, and I venture to recommend it as a mission..." - Oscar Wilde, "Letter to the Pall Mall Gazette on the Subject of 'The Best Hundred Books'" (qtd. Wright, Built of Books, 317).

"I wish you joy o'th' worm" - Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, 5.2.270.

"The world must be peopled!" - Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." - Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice.

"That a man who has sons brings up chickens for his own table ... whereas daughters are chickens brought up for the tables of other men." - Samuel Richardson, Clarissa (77).

“No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” - Samuel Beckett

And then there is more Oscar Wilde:

"It is what you read when you don't have to that determines what you will be when you can't help it."

"You can never be overdressed or overeducated."

"You will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you never had the courage to commit." - The Picture of Dorian Gray.

"Appearance blinds, whereas words reveal." - Personal Impressions of America

"A poet can survive everything but a misprint." - "The Children of the Poets", The Pall Mall Gazette

"There is no sin except stupidity." - The Critic as Artist

"One should always be a little improbable." - "Phrases and Philosophies for the use of the Young"

"The truth is rarely pure and never simple." - The Importance of Being Earnest

"Even when reading is impossible, the presence of books acquired produces such an ecstasy that the buying of more books than one can read is nothing less than the soul reaching towards infinity... we cherish books even if unread, their mere presence exudes comfort, their ready access, reassurance."
--- A.E. Newton