American Literature reflects life, and the struggles that we face during our existence. The great authors of our time incorporate life's problems into their literature directly and indirectly. The stories themselves bluntly tell us a story; however, an author also uses symbols to relay to us his message in a subtler manner. Imagery could also be seen through The House of Seven Gables. In Nathaniel Hawthorne's book, the House of Seven Gable's symbolism, characters, and imagery are used to enhance the story by showing the fight between good and evil.
             The book begins by describing the most obvious symbol of the house itself. The house itself takes on human like characteristics as Hawthorne is describing it in the opening chapters. The house is described as "breathing through the spiracles of one great chimney"(Hawthorne 7). Hawthorne uses descriptive lines like this to turn the house into a symbol of the lives that have passed through its walls. The house takes on a persona of a living creature that exists and influences the lives of everybody who enters through its doors (Colacurcio 113). "So much of mankind's varied experience had passed there - so much had been suffered, and something, too, enjoyed - that the very timbers were oozy, as with the moisture of a heart." (Hawthorne 27). Hawthorne turns the house into a symbol of the collection of all the hearts that were darkened by the house. Evert Augustus Duyckinck agrees that "The chief perhaps, of the dramatis personae, is the house itself. From its turrets to its kitchen, in every nook and recess without and within, it is alive and vital." (Hawthorne 352) Duyckinck feels that the house is meant to be used as a symbol of an actual character, "Truly it is an actor in the scene"(Hawthorne 352). This turns the house into an interesting, but still depressing place that darkens the book in many ways.
             Hawthorne means for the house's gloomy atmosphere to symboli...