Abstract:
Shirley Jackson’s novel The Haunting of Hill House, published in 1959, emerged during a period
of familial reimagination. Indeed, the predominantly white, nuclear, and patriarchal family
structure demanded by society now faced new scrutiny as people began considering the
destruction these dynamics imposed on the individual. Jackson’s novel particularly attends to
this debilitating relationship between controlling parental figures and daughters. By reading
through the lens of trauma theory more broadly, this essay argues that Jackson’s text illuminates
the complexities of familial trauma as well as the nuances of post-traumatic growth (PTG).