We Have Always Lived in the Castle (1962)

Shirley Jackson’s last novel is often called a masterpiece and that’s fair enough, except I’m more inclined to think of Jackson as a short-story writer and “The Lottery” as her masterpiece. ISFDB relegates this short novel to “non-genre” and Wikipedia classifies it as a mystery. No one seems to know what to do with it, including me, though I have no objection to the masterpiece label. It’s about a family with many dark secrets. The darkest may be the one kept by Mary Katherine “Merricat” Blackwood, age 18, the first-person narrator. The Blackwoods have long been resented by the locals for being rich and aloof. A few years before the time of this story someone poisoned the entire family with arsenic in the sugar bowl. Only three survived: Merricat and her sister Constance, who didn’t take sugar with the berries that were served, and Uncle Julian, who barely survived the poisoning and is now disabled and in a wheelchair, with mild encroaching dementia. Merricat is the one most able to go into town twice a week for groceries, but she has to be careful or the townspeople will hassle her. I’m not going to give it away but it’s not hard to figure out who did the poisoning, which is readily revealed at about the beginning of the last third of the novel. Constance was charged with the crime but acquitted, leaving the Blackwoods more isolated and reviled than ever. One day their unpleasant cousin Charles shows up and makes an attempt to take over the family. He’s mostly interested in their money. Merricat can’t stand him and wants him to leave, but he intends to stay. Eventually the conflict leads to the house catching fire, destroying the upper floors. Firefighters—who also hate the Blackwoods—arrive to put out the blaze and the rest of the town shows up to watch and catcall. “Let it burn,” is their sentiment. After the fire is under control a riot breaks out. The townspeople enter the home and destroy everything in it that they can. The fire and the riot are amazing, vivid, painful scenes. The entire novel is suffused with intense tensions. In some ways it’s hard to know why We Have Always Lived in the Castle even exists, it is so full of hate and rage and pointless fury. But it’s also powerful and unforgettable—as good as any reasons to exist.

In case the library is closed due to pandemic, which is over. (Library of America)