But one rich, powerful, corrupt man--Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon--coveting the mansion's hidden secrets. And his plot to find them meant destroying all hope and happiness in The House of the Seven Gables. Not for someone afraid to use a dictionary. But really, the themes are universal and relevant. You gotta like this style of writing or don't take it on. It's very ponderous and plodding. It's preachy -- Hawthorne's ideas of right and wrong are very specific. He has little respect for folks who don't take the well-worn path, and he uses his literary genius to preach his version of good and evil His genius is in his use of language, and the story, while not deep, may cause some reflection.
So, why read it? Because the language is stunning, Hawthorne's stories represent the times very well, and in their simplicity, one can absorb the culture of the times. Nathaniel Hawthorne was the great grandson of Judge John Hathorne, the infamous cruel, biased, and possibly self serving judge of the Salem Witch Trials. The themes of witch trials, lost inheritances, family curses, and greed figure in this book.
Hawthorne's literary style is flowery, overly descriptive, and tedious, making for a difficult read, unless you are interested in the Salem witch trials and the impact they had on the descendants of the judges, accusers, and victims. Ghosts or No Ghosts? I became a fan of classic literature in grade school. My love of reading was enhanced by my fourth grade teacher, Mrs Carpenter. The full weight of the gloomy mansion of the title seems to sit on the fortunes of the Pyncheon family.
Now, almost two centuries later, the family is in real distress. Hepzibah, an old maid and resident of the house, is forced by advanced poverty to open a shop in a part of the house. Her brother Clifford has just been released from prison after serving a thirty-year sentence for murder, and his mind struggles to maintain any kind of hold on reality. Cousin Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon is making himself odious by threatening to have Clifford committed to an institution.
And after all these years, the deed to a vast tract of land, that would settle great wealth on the family, is still missing. One bright ray of sunshine enters the house when cousin Phoebe arrives for an extended stay to allow unhappy matters in her end of the family to sort themselves out. Phoebe insists that Uncle Venner come live in the cottage on the judge's property.
Clifford seconds the invitation and when the foursome prepare to depart, Uncle Venner is to follow them a few days later. Children gather around the carriage, and Hepzibah notices Ned Higgins, to whom she gives some money. The two laborers pass and acknowledge Hepzibah's good fortune. Leaving the house, Uncle Venner fancies he hears Alice Pyncheon playing her harpsichord as she ascends to heaven.
Ned Higgins, a young boy, is Hepzibah's first shop customer. He is a repeat customer who enjoys the shop's gingerbread cookies. When Phoebe returns from her visit home and later discovers that the judge has died in the parlor, Ned warns her that something wicked has happened in the house.
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As Hepzibah, Clifford, Phoebe, and Holgrave leave to take up residence at the judge's country estate, Hepzibah gives Ned money. Holgrave is a resident in one of the gables in the House of the Seven Gables. The narrator describes him as "a slender young man, not more than one or two and twenty years old, with a rather grave and thoughtful expression, for his years, but likewise a springy alacrity and vigor.
Holgrave falls in love with Phoebe and, in the final chapter, reveals that he is a descendent of Matthew Maule. Toward the end of the story, Holgrave tells Clifford, Hepzibah, and Phoebe where the now worthless deed to the Maine land can be found. Holgrave is a young and passionate character whose politics run contrary to the conservative ideals that the aristocratic Hepzibah embraces.
Both professionally and personally, he represents the coming of the modern age and the retiring of past traditions. Although he has dabbled in several occupations, including dentistry and teaching, Holgrave is now a daguerreotypist, or a photographer. His profession represents the way in which he is a forward thinker who enjoys the changes brought by technology. Unlike Clifford, who is at first nostalgic about the past, Holgrave favors the future.
Like his ancestor, Matthew Maule, Holgrave has the power of mesmerism, or the ability to hypnotize people. Unlike the younger Matthew Maule, Holgrave does not use this power in harmful ways against other people, specifically Phoebe. Matthew Maule is the first owner of the land upon which the House of the Seven Gables is eventually built. He is not a man of great wealth or power, yet he stands up against Colonel Pyncheon and refuses to give him his land. As a result, Maule is put on trial for practicing witchcraft and is ultimately convicted and hung. Just before his death, Maule curses Colonel Pyncheon, who watches the proceedings from horseback.
Maule says, "God will give him blood to drink. Maule's son, Thomas, served as the architect of the House of the Seven Gables. The younger Matthew Maule is the grandson of Matthew Maule the elder. The younger Matthew Maule makes a deal with Gervayse Pyncheon, telling him that he will tell him where the legendary deed is for the land in Maine in trade for the House of the Seven Gables.
The Maule spirits thwart his efforts and refuse to let the Colonel tell him where the papers are hidden. Matthew Maule the younger cancels the deal with Gervayse but keeps Alice Pyncheon under his spell. He makes her do humiliating things and eventually, releasing her from his spell, allows her to walk home improperly clothed for snow. She dies as a result. He is the architect that built the House of the Seven Gables. When Thomas builds the house, he hides the deed to the legendary land in Maine behind the portrait of Colonel Pyncheon. Alice Pyncheon is the daughter of Gervayse Pyncheon, the granddaughter of Colonel Pyncheon, and Phoebe's great-great-grand-aunt.
Hepzibah describes her as "exceedingly beautiful and accomplished. Once Alice is released from Matthew's spell, she walks home inappropriately clothed for the snow and dies. The flowers that grow in between two of the gables are said to have been sprinkled there by Alice. They are called Alice's Posies. Sometimes the sounds of her harpsichord are said to be heard in the house. After being framed by his cousin for the murder of his uncle, Old Jaffrey Pyncheon, Clifford is imprisoned for thirty years. He returns to the House of the Seven Gables following his imprisonment and is cared for by Hepzibah and Phoebe.
Prior to his incarceration, Clifford is a man of privilege who enjoys all that is beautiful. This quality persists in him and is evident in his inability to look at his unattractive, scowling sister and his desire to quit the "dismal house" for finer accommodations in the South of France and Italy. He fancies Phoebe and seems to lose himself in the sensual undertaking of eating. Following his imprisonment, Clifford is a changed man. No longer masculine or mature, he is characterized by the narrator as feminine and childlike.
When readers first meet Clifford, he is described as elderly and spiritless. The narrator writes "It was the spirit of the man, that could not walk" as though he "must have suffered some miserable wrong from its earthly experience. He wishes to recover the life that is symbolized by the "antique fashions of the street. After finding Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon dead, Clifford seems more equipped to embrace the future. As he and Hepzibah flee by train, he talks with a fellow traveler and lauds the advances of modern science and technology.
Clifford's new attitude toward technology and his inherited wealth from Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon foretell a brighter future for him as well as for Hepzibah, Phoebe, and Holgrave, who all move out of the House of the Seven Gables to the judge's estate.
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Colonel Pyncheon is the man who had the House of the Seven Gables built years before the action of the story takes place. He built the house on a piece of land that first belonged to Matthew Maule the elder. Colonel Pyncheon was instrumental in having the elder Matthew Maule put to death for witchcraft.
As a result of Matthew's death, Colonel Pyncheon was able to seize the land that he had long tried to obtain from Matthew. On the day that Colonel Pyncheon hosts a grand house warming party with many important community members in attendance, he is found dead in his study. In the story that unfolds, Colonel Pyncheon's portrait still hangs in the house and the legend of the Pyncheon and Maule conflict serves as the basis for one of Hawthorne's themes, which is that the sins of the past are carried down through successive generations.
Like the Colonel, two other Pyncheon men die of apoplexy, an unexpected hemorrhage. Gervayse is Colonel Pyncheon's son and Alice Pyncheon's father. In the story that Holgrave relates to Phoebe, Gervayse is said to have returned from Europe and begun to search for the deed to the land in Maine that the Colonel was in the process of acquiring at the time of his death. Gervayse summons the younger Matthew Maule to the house and makes a deal to give him the House of the Seven Gables in exchange for information about the missing deed. Matthew the younger then hypnotizes Alice, who eventually dies due in part to his mistreatment of her.
Gervayse's greed can be blamed for his daughter's death. Hepzibah is the struggling spinster heroine of the novel. She resides in the House of the Seven Gables. She is Clifford's sister and Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon's niece. In the novel, she represents "old Gentility" with a reverence for the past and her previously well-to-do life. The narrator describes her "cherished and ridiculous consciousness" of her privileged ancestry, "her shadowy claims to princely territory.
The townspeople have little compassion for her and suspect her enterprise will fail. For the most part, the residents of the town seem to dislike Hepzibah. The narrator writes "they cared nothing for her dignity, and just as little for her degradation. Her rough and unapproachable exterior, however, hides a tender heart. She is deeply devoted to her brother and holds deep hatred and contempt for her cousin. Hepzibah's impoverished existence seems to better her. The narrator writes "she had been enriched by poverty, developed by sorrow … and endowed with heroism, which never could have characterized her in what are called happier circumstances.
The judge dies toward the end of the book, and because his son dies from cholera, Clifford inherits the judge's riches. Prior to becoming a judge, the younger Jaffrey Pyncheon facilitated the death of his uncle. While the young Jaffrey was rifling through the old man's papers, the elder Jaffrey Pyncheon happened upon him and died of apoplexy. The younger Jaffrey destroyed a newly revised version of the elder Jaffrey's will, which favored Clifford, and successfully framed Clifford for their uncle's death. The judge later assists in Clifford's release from jail and his return to the House of the Seven Gables in hopes that he can help him locate papers that will point him to the remainder of their uncle's estate.
As the narrator tells us, the judge was "reckoned rather a dissipated youth, but had at once reformed, and made himself an exceedingly respectable member of society. Hawthorne evidences this fact by drawing strong comparison's between the judge and Colonel Pyncheon. When shown Holgrave's photograph of the judge, Phoebe mistakes him for the Colonel, and the narrator comments of their likeness:. It implied that the weaknesses and defects, the bad passions, the mean tendencies, and the moral diseases which lead to crime, are handed down from one generation to another, by a far surer process of transmission than human law has been able to establish, in respect to the riches and honors which it seeks to entail upon posterity.
Like the Colonel, the judge is motivated by his own greed and strong desire for self-aggrandizement. He is a selfish, deceitful, and cruel man. His apparently benevolent attempts to help Clifford and Hepzibah are as false as the smiles he presents to the public. In the end, the public learns albeit through rumors, about his hand in the old Jaffrey Pyncheon's death and Clifford's imprisonment.
Like Colonel Pyncheon, old Jaffrey Pyncheon dies of apoplexy. His affliction is triggered when he finds the younger Jaffrey rifling through his personal papers. The younger Jaffrey Pyncheon inherits the elder's wealth. Old Jaffrey Pyncheon believed that "Matthew Maule, the wizard, had been wronged out of his homestead, if not out of his life," and intended "to make restitution to Maule's posterity" before his death, but was unable to do so. Phoebe is a Pyncheon relation from the country. She comes to visit Hepzibah after her Phoebe's mother remarries.
She falls in love with Holgrave, cares for Clifford when he cannot bear to look at his sister, and much to the neighborhood's delight, works in Hepzibah's cent-shop. Whereas Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon the younger can be seen to represent all that is evil, Phoebe represents all that is good.
The narrator describes her as "very pretty; as graceful as a bird, and graceful much in the same way; as pleasant, about the house, as a gleam of sunshine. Like the sunshine, she has a refreshing influence on all of the characters, particularly Hepzibah and Clifford. When Phoebe first arrives at the House of the Seven Gables, she fixes up her living quarters. The narrator notes that it had now "been purified of all former evil and sorrow by her sweet breath and happy thoughts.
He is one of Hepzibah's first customers. Clifford finds his company agreeable as well, and he joins the two along with Phoebe and Holgrave for picnics. The narrator says that he "was commonly regarded as rather deficient, than otherwise, in his wits," but that there was "something like poetry in him. As stated in the preface, one of the primary themes in The House of the Seven Gables is that "the wrong-doing of one generation lives into the successive ones.
Just before his death, Matthew Maule the elder curses Colonel Pyncheon, stating that "God will give him blood to drink. This first death is followed by the similar deaths of old Jaffrey Pyncheon and his nephew, Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon. Although these deaths can be attributed to a family predisposition for apoplexy, the existence of the curse and the similar nature of each death suggest something supernatural about the way in which such sinful behavior resurfaces within a family's lineage.
This supernatural element conveys the idea that individuals are somewhat unable to control their own destinies. Another way to read Hawthorne's suggested theme, however, is that in this case, the Pyncheon family was not cursed by Matthew Maule and his supernatural powers as much as they were by their own folly. Colonel Pyncheon, old Jaffrey Pyncheon, Alice Pyncheon, and Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon all die because of either their own avarice or that of one of their close family members. To this extent, then, the responsibility for evil or wrong doing lies with the individual rather than with the ancestors who may have made similarly poor decisions and had similar personality and character flaws.
Hawthorne devotes much of his commentary in this novel to the discussion of class. This theme is first introduced by the distinctions between the Pyncheon and Maule families and their descendents. The Pyncheons were a prominent, wealthy, and successful family while the Maules were "generally poverty-stricken; always plebian and obscure; working with unsuccessful diligence at handicrafts; laboring on the wharves, or following the sea. Through her struggle about opening and running the cent-shop readers learn about aristocratic views of the lower classes and vice-versa.
Now impoverished, Hepzibah represents both the aristocratic viewpoint and that of the working class. In the third chapter, the narrator writes of her:. On the whole, therefore, her new experience led our decayed gentlewoman to very disagreeable conclusions as to the temper and manners of what she termed the lower classes, whom, heretofore, she had looked down upon with a gentle and pitying complaisance, as herself occupying a sphere of unquestionable superiority.
Within moments of this thought, however, she expresses disdain for "a lady, in a delicate and costly summer garb, with a floating veil and gracefully swaying gown. Must the whole world toil, that the palms of her hands may be kept white and delicate? Of Hepzibah, he writes:. Truly was there something high, generous, and noble, in her native composition of our poor old Hepzibah…. Another predominant theme in this novel is greed.
Colonel Pyncheon's original motivation for supporting the execution of Matthew Maule the elder involved his strong desire to obtain the property that had long belonged to him Matthew. Ultimately, the Colonel builds his home on Matthew's land and meets his death during his first house-warming feast. Successive generations of Pyncheons also seem to be afflicted with this trait. Gervayse Pyncheon's desire to find the deed to the legendary land in Maine leads to the death of his daughter, Alice. Likewise, Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon's pursuit of his uncle's estate leads to his death and that of his uncle, old Jaffrey Pyncheon.
In each case, Pyncheons suffer because of their desire to obtain wealth. This desire blinds them and prohibits them from making moral decisions. Thus, the cost of greed can be seen not only as the loss of morality, but of life itself. The House of the Seven Gables is a Gothic novel, which is a type of novel that was popularized in England in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
Gothic romances trace back to Horace Walpole's novel, The Castle of Otranto and were often mysteries that involved the supernatural.
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Characteristically, novels of this type take place in haunted castles or other remote and isolated locations. Often, gothic romances involve a heroine in peril and are peppered with horror and violence. The House of the Seven Gables clearly takes after this genre. Though not a castle, the House of the Seven Gables is a desolate home that has a seemingly ongoing history of violence within its walls. The house is haunted by the curse that Matthew Maule the elder placed on Colonel Pyncheon in just before the former's execution for witchcraft.
The mysterious deaths of Colonel Pyncheon, Jaffrey Pyncheon, and Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon, along with Matthew Maule's alleged witchcraft, his grandson's ability to mesmerize Alice Pyncheon, and later Holgrave's ability to do the same with Phoebe all can be seen as supernatural elements within the text. The House of the Seven Gables is told primarily in the third-person omniscient point of view. This means that the narrator, who is not a character in the story, tells the events of the story from a "godlike" perspective.
The narrator knows everything about the characters and the events, past and present, relating to the action of the story. Interestingly, there are times that Hawthorne's narrator lapses into the first-person plural point of view, referring to himself and an unknown other person perhaps the reader, perhaps not as "we.
In the preface, the narrator makes a point to tell readers that the story they are about to read is a "Romance" rather than a "Novel. Light and dark imagery permeates The House of the Seven Gables. The Proper 'Light and Shadow' in the Major Romances , the house as well as the characters are all cast in a reoccurring pattern of lightness-darkness or sunshine-storm.
For Fogle, light and sunshine stand for "general good fortune, for material prosperity, and for harmonious kinship with society. Phoebe is associated with light. While Hepzibah and Clifford were once associated with light, they have fallen into darkness. Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon, as Fogle notes, is "a false sun god" who "passes from one extreme to the other. At the beginning of the second half of the nineteenth century, Americans were optimistically looking forward to the future. Opportunity was the buzzword of the day as territorial expansion and the industrial revolution continued to sweep the nation.
The gold rush was on in California and with such economic opportunity feeding their dreams, Americans continued to seek land, wealth, and individual success. Despite such hope and enthusiasm, the country was becoming increasingly divided on the issue of slavery. The debate about abolition was closely linked to the issue of territorial expansion. During President James K. Polk's term in office, the United States nearly doubled in size, but with this expansion came questions of the status of blacks in the new territories.
With the Compromise of , California was admitted to the United States as a "free" state, yet other territories were allowed to decide whether they wanted to permit slavery or not. Also in , the Fugitive Slave Act went into effect, which stated that fugitive slave commissioners could issue arrest warrants for fugitive slaves and order their return to their masters. The act enraged anti-slavery states, and also in , states like Vermont began to pass their own personal-liberty legislation.
This legislation stated that fugitive slaves who escaped to free states did not have to be turned over to federal officers for return to their masters. Ultimately, the nation's deeply divided consciousness on the issue of slavery led to the American Civil War , which began in While the nation's attention was largely focused on issues of slavery and territorial expansion, the women's rights movement continued to gain strength. The United States Constitution of lacked specifications about who had the right to vote, and thus left the question up to the states, who largely granted such rights only to landowning white men.
In , a group of women who supported abolition met in Seneca Falls, New York , and sought to change this preference. The group, which included Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, officially set the Woman's Rights Movement in motion, calling for suffrage and equal. In , the first national women's rights convention was held in Worcester, Massachusetts, with Susan B. Anthony, Soujourner Truth, and Lucretia Mott all in attendance. In , a group of young women in Salem Village, which is now called Danvers, became hysterical after engaging in fortune telling rituals.
The group, which included the minister's daughter, Ann Putnam, were eventually diagnosed as being under the spell of witchcraft and were pressed to tell who it was that had bewitched them. The girls began to accuse people, starting with three neighborhood women. The fervor took hold of the community and with a growing number of imprisonments resulting, the newly appointed Massachusetts governor Sir William Phips convened a special court to try the accused.
In the months that followed, one hundred and fifty arrests were made, and many people were imprisoned. In the end, twenty individuals were hanged for the crime of practicing witchcraft. Hawthorne's great-grandfather, John Hathorne, was one of the three judges to preside over the trials.
In , the Massachusetts General Court financially compensated the families of some of the victims and their families for the wrongdoing. Like much of Hawthorne's work, The House of the Seven Gables has received ongoing attention from critics and scholars since its publication in The Nathaniel Hawthorne Society http: To Hawthorne's credit, his work remains in print and remains part of the core curriculum taught in American literature courses. Of his critics, Hawthorne himself was likely one of the strongest. In the introduction to Hawthorne: The Critical Heritage , J. Donald Crowley quotes Hawthorne writing to Longfellow:.
As to my literary efforts, I do not think much of them—neither is it worthwhile to be ashamed of them. They would have been better, I trust, if written under more favorable circumstances. I have no external excitement—no consciousness that the public would like what I wrote, nor much hope, nor a very passionate desire that they should do so. Nevertheless, having nothing else to be ambitious of, I have felt considerably interested in literature.
Sometimes, when tired of it, it strikes me that the whole is an absurdity from beginning to end … my prevailing idea is, that the book ought to succeed better than "The Scarlet Letter," though I have no idea it will. In fact, The House of the Seven Gables did succeed better than The Scarlet Letter and both have continued to be some of Hawthorne's best-known and studied work. As can be expected, the reviews, commentary, and critical analysis of The House of the Seven Gables have varied in focus over the past one-hundred and fifty-three years and will likely continue to do so. In "The House of the Seven Gables": Severing Family and Colonial Ties , Peter Buitenhuis notes that "each age has to reevaluate the classics and read them in the light of its own cultural and critical assumptions, which gradually change over time.
Upon its publication, The House of the Seven Gables garnered much praise. Writing for Graham's Magazine in , Edwin Percy Whipple wrote "Taken as a whole, it is Hawthorne's greatest work, and is equally sure of immediate popularity and permanent fame. In his review of the novel for Athanaeum in , Chorley wrote that Hawthorne "possesses the fertility as well as the ambition of Genius.
In his day and beyond, however, Hawthorne has had his dissenters. He has been criticized for his characterizations, the novel's lack of plot structure, its point of view, and the somewhat too neatly tied up ending. In Rage for Order: Essays in Criticism, , Austin Warren wrote "The characters do not really develop or change; and we do not find it easy to remember their speech, for Hawthorne has no considered notion of what parts of his story to put into dialogue, what not. The point of view is clumsily managed, for the novel professes to be narrated by an "I" who presently passes into "we.
Despite its weaknesses, The House of the Seven Gables continues to be regarded as one of Hawthorne's greatest works and has served as fodder for a continuing diverse range of critical study. Critics have analyzed the work from divergent perspectives, evaluating its autobiographical, psychological, social, emotional, mythical, historical, and political implications. To be sure, such a wide range of interpretations will continue, for as Buitenhuis reminds "there is never an end to interpretation. Robeson is a freelance writer with a master's degree in English. In this essay, Robeson explores the ambiguous views expressed in the novel about the aristocracy and the working classes.
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Class distinctions permeate The House of the Seven Gables. The story commences with an immediate contrast between the wealthy Colonel Pyncheon and the farmer, Matthew Maule. Later, at Colonel Pyncheon's housewarming party, guests are either ushered into the kitchen or into the home's more stately rooms depending on "the high or low degree" of each person. Through these early images, readers have an immediate sense that issues of social class are one of Hawthorne's central themes.
In that the novel is considered to reflect much of Hawthorne's own life, one must wonder to what degree his views about the aristocracy and the working classes are embedded within the story. On the one hand, one might readily conclude that Hawthorne held contempt and disdain for the aristocracy for their idleness and unwavering interest in the acquisition of material wealth.
The first villain of the story, Colonel Pyncheon, exemplifies all that is reprehensible in men of questionable morals who are self-indulgent and motivated simply by the desire to build their estates, figuratively and literally. At the same time, the characterization of Hepzibah serves to point out the lack of purpose or function that can sometimes epitomize the upper classes. While Hepzibah's shame about falling into poverty and being forced to open a cent-shop is an absolute horror to her, the narrator at times adapts a somewhat mocking tone in regards to both her angst and her understanding of her previously privileged social position.
The narrator describes Hepzibah as having a "deeply cherished and ridiculous consciousness of long descent" from wealthy ancestors. Further, when the narrator notes her "accomplishments," which include "having formerly thrummed on a harpsichord, and walked a minuet, and worked an antique tapestry-stitch on her sampler," one can almost hear the laughter in the description.
Of the shop opening, Hepzibah concludes "I never can go through with it! I wish I were dead, and in the old family-tomb, with all my forefathers! Yet, through Hepzibah's dialogue with Holgrave, readers glean a different perspective, one perhaps embraced by Hawthorne. Holgrave encourages Hepzibah, telling her:. These names of gentleman and lady had a meaning, in the past history of the world, and conferred privileges, desirable and otherwise, on those entitled to bear them.
In the present—and still more in the future condition of society—they imply, not privilege, but restrictions! I look upon this as one of the fortunate days of your life. It ends an epoch and begins one. Hitherto, the lifeblood has been gradually chilling in your veins, as you sat aloof, within your circle of gentility, while the rest of the world was fighting out its battle with one kind o necessity or another.
The House of the Seven Gables. (Gothic Novel) by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Henceforth, you will at least have the sense of healthy and natural effort for a purpose. For Hawthorne, there is something almost laughable in Hepzibah's dramatic feeling of loss, for to him, the aristocratic ways are a thing of the past, and valor and honor are now born of self-determination rather than inherited good fortune. Hawthorne's strongest opinions about the aristocracy's ongoing concern for the accrual of wealth seem to be conveyed best by the narrator's view of the monkey who accompanies the organ player.
Of the monkey, the narrator says that he symbolized "the grossest form of the love of money. Neither was there any possibility of satisfying the covetous little devil. Neither shall you desire your neighbor's house, or field … or anything that belongs to your neighbor. Through Uncle Venner, Hawthorne reinforces this perspective: While the aristocracy seems to be looked down upon in this novel, the working class representatives seem to be respected, if not lauded. Phoebe is a perfect example. Although she is a Pyncheon, she is not part of the aristocracy, and yet, she is described by the narrator as more of a lady than Hepzibah.
Further, because of her experience as a working class person, Hepzibah is viewed by the narrator as a better person: Once the shop is under way, she is filled with "a thrill of almost youthful enjoyment. It was the invigorating breath of a fresh outward atmosphere, after the long torpor and monotonous seclusion of her life.
So wholesome is effort! So miraculous the strength that we do not know of! The healthiest glow, that Hepzibah had known for years, had come now, in the dreaded crisis, when, for the first time, she had put forth her hand to help herself. Holgrave's assessment of the situation again perhaps reveals Hawthorne's own opinion. Of the shop opening, Holgrave tells Hepzibah, "This is success—all the success that anybody meets with! While the above seems to clearly indicate Hawthorne's distaste for the aristocracy and more favorable impression of the working classes, the novel also offers examples that would lead readers to question this assessment.
For example, despite his position as a wealthy Pyncheon, old Jaffrey Pyncheon was compelled to right the wrongs of his ancestor, Colonel Pyncheon.