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We Have Always Lived in the Castle, by Shirley Jackson

We Have Always Lived in the Castle is 1962 mystery novel by author Shirley Jackson, who also famously wrote The Lottery (1948) and The Haunting of Hill House (1959). The story is about the Blackwoods, a very wealthy family who owns a large state. Since the death of their parents, Constance Blackwood has been taking care of her younger sister, Mary Katherine (better known as Merricat) and their wheelchair bound uncle, Julian. The three of them live in perfect recluse in their manor, but when cousin Charles comes to visit, he shakes up the family dynamic.

Despite their relationship not being explicitly incestuous in the novel, Constance and Merricat share a bond closer than most sisters do. If you have read Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House, you may remember Eleanor and Theo, who weren't explicitly in a romantic relationship, but were very lesbian coded. The same applies for the Blackwood sisters, in my opinion.

In 1966 the novel was made into a play by Hugh Wheeler, and this play was used as the basis for the 2010 musical by Adam Bock and Todd Almond. But, more famously, in 2018, there was a movie adaptation by Stacie Passon, starring Taissa Farmiga as Merricat, Alexandra Daddario as Constance, Sebastian Stan as Charles and Crispin Glover as Julian.

The book is narrated by eighteen-years-old Merricat Blackwood. Despite her age, her behaviour throughout the novel is very immature and childish, probably due to the trauma she suffered at twelve, when the rest of her family (save for her sister and uncle) died. She's also very superstitious and practices sympathetic magic.

Merricat lives with Constance and Julian in the large Blackwood property in near isolation. Her only contact with the outside world is going to the village to buy groceries and visit the library. The locals aren't very keen on the Blackwood family, eyeing them with suspicion since the deaths that occurred years prior and resenting the large amount of money the family has, despite not doing any hard work.

No, really, the people in town are really nasty towards the sisters, with the children even making a mean song about them, akin to how people made that skipping rope song about Lizzie Borden.

"Merricat, said Connie, would you like a cup of tea? Oh no, said Merricat, you’ll poison me. Merricat, said Connie, would you like to go to sleep? Down in the boneyard ten feet deep!"

You see, the reason for the rhyme is that six years before the events in the book, the sisters parents, their younger brother as well as Uncle Julian and his wife were poised wit arsenic that had been mixed into the sugar bowl. Julian was the only survivor and Constance wasn't poisoned because she didn't eat sugar with her blackberries, and Merricat hadn't been in the dinner that night. Due to her being the only person present who wasn't poisoned, she was arrested and charged with murder, but ended up being acquitted and released back, much to the distaste of the village.

Probably due to her fear that Constance will be taken away again, Merricat has developed many "magical" protections around the property to avoid strangers coming in (it must be noted that Constance herself doesn't leave the house since the trial finished, so the magic could be to keep Constance safe). It's clear, from the beginning, that Merricat loves her sister and has a strong devotion to her. The feeling is mutual as evidenced by Constance telling Merricat how much she missed her, even thought Merricat had only been to village for, at most, a couple hours.

"When I was small I thought Constance was a fairy princess. I used to try to draw her picture, with long golden hair and eyes as blue as the crayon could make them, and a bright pink spot on either cheek; the pictures always surprised me, because she did look like that; even at the worst time she was pink and white and golden, and nothing had ever seemed to dim the brightness of her. She was the most precious person in my world, always."

Julian, their widowed uncle, spend his time writing his memories of the day of the poisoning, obsessively looking at the details of what happened that day and on the day before and it is through his ramblings about the event that we, the readers, learn about what happened. For exemple, he is the one who exposes the fact that Constance was the one who did the cooking, and that she has knowledge of different poisons. Not only that, but she didn't use sugar on her blackberries (although it was a known fact that she never did) and washed the sugar bowl before the police could arrive to the scene - allegedly because there was a spider in it.

Merricat is perfectly happy with Constance staying at home the whole time, as in this way she has her sister basically all to herself. When Constance starts to express some desire to leave the house, Merricat becomes upset and reacts by violently breaking their mother's fancy milk pitcher. Although she doesn't verbally express her displeasure or lashes out in front of Constance, Merricat often breaks things around the house, leaving a path of destruction on the wake of her anger.

"'We’ll always be here together, won’t we, Constance?' 'Don’t you ever want to leave here, Merricat?' 'Where could we go?' I asked her. 'What place would be better for us than this? Who wants us, outside? The world is full of terrible people.' 'I wonder sometimes.' She was very serious for a minute, and then she turned and smiled at me. 'Don’t you worry, my Merricat. Nothing bad will happen.'"

Before Constance can decide if she's ready to explore the outside world, the outside world comes knocking in the form of Cousin Charles, son of her father's other brother. Merricat dislikes him at first sight and even tries to pretend she had only dreamed about his visit and could "dream him away", but Constance seems glad to have the attention of a good looking young man, even if he is her cousin.

Charles claims he wanted to help his cousins after the tragedy that had struck, but hadn't been able because his father wouldn't allow it, but now that his father was dead, he wanted to reunite with the remaining family. Merricat is jealous of how easily Costance (whom Charles calls 'Connie') warms up to the newcomer.

"She was not at all awkward or uncomfortable; it was as though she had been expecting all her life that Cousin Charles would come, as though she had planned exactly what to do and say, almost as though in the house of her life there had always been a room kept for Cousin Charles."

To keep Charles away, Merricat nails a gold watch into a tree, and when Charles sees it, he gets angry because it was a waste of gold. His obsession with money leads Julian to start to think that Charles is only there to try to steal the family fortune.

Charles is no innocent either. When he realises that he won't win Merricat's affection, he quickly start being passive aggressive with her, even insinuating that he might convince Constance to throw her out. And at the same time he tells Connie she should not be waiting on Julian, Charles also has her cook and clean for himself.

Merricat tries her best to shield herself and her sister, but all she can actually do is small actions, like breaking Charles' watch and pouring water in his bed. Charles gets furious with Merricat's childish antics and while Constance doesn't condenes her sister, she doesn't defends her either, simply calling Merricat "silly".

"'You are evil,' I said to Charles. 'You are a ghost and a demon.' 'What the hell?' Charles said. 'Don’t pay any attention,' Constance told him. 'Don’t listen to Merricat’s nonsense.'"

During a large argument between Charles, Merricat and Julian, Charles tell them that Merricat needs to be punished, which makes her run away in fear. Upset and even more angry than before, Merricat waits until dinner time and goes to Charles room, and she finds his pipe, which was still burning. She then throws in into a pile of papers which causes a fire to start. They are in the table when Charles smells smoke.

Constance and Merricat run for safety, but Julian stays behind to gather his papers (the many manuscripts he wrote of his memories from the day of the poisoning). The firefighters come, but they eye the sisters with suspicion, causing them to run and hide in the woods surrounding the property. While all this is going on, Charles is worried about the money in the safe.

"Pulling Constance, I hurried under the trees, in the darkness; when I felt my feet leave the grass of the lawn and touch the soft mossy ground of the path through the woods and knew that the trees had closed in around us I stopped and put my arms around Constance. 'It’s all over,' I told her, and held her tight."

While hiding in the forest, Merricat says that she'll poison everyone and Constance acknowledges that Merricat had done that once before, six years before, by putting arsenic in the sugar as payback for having been sent to the bedroom without dinner.

"'I put it in the sugar.' 'I know. I knew then.' 'You never used sugar.' 'No.' 'So I put it in the sugar.'"

Morning comes and the sisters come out of their hiding spot to see the damage that happened to the house. Most of it is gone, but they decide to clean the few rooms that didn't get crushed or burned and keep living there. Due to the lack of a roof, the house now looks like a castle (hence the title) and with time, vines grow to cover the remaining structure. Charles, who had survived the fire, tries to talk to Constance again, but she rejects him.

The Blackwood sisters become a short of local legend and villagers leave offerings of food in their doorsteps. They go on with living happily in the house, having only each other's company, because they don't need anything else.

"'I love you, Constance,' I said. 'And I love you, my Merricat.'"

Like a said before, they are not canonically incestuous, but it isn't difficult to see why they are so shippable. They protect each other at all costs and can barely function when separated. Since the book ends with them going into isolation, who knows what feelings might come to light?

#constance and merricat #proship #shipcest #sibcest #non canon #sisters #we have always lived in the castle #shirley jackson #book review

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