The Haunting of Hill House Quotes

“None of them heard it, she thought with joy; nobody heard it but me.”

″‘I don’t stay after I set out dinner,’ Mrs. Dudley went on. ‘Not after it begins to get dark. I leave before dark comes.‘”

“God God—whose hand was I holding?”

“‘It’s the home I’ve always dreamed of,’ Theodora said. ‘A little hideaway where I can be alone with my thoughts. Particularly if my thoughts happen to be about murder or suicide or—‘”

″‘Don’t look back,’ she cried out in a voice high with fear, ‘don’t look back—don’t look—run!‘”

“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.”

“The light changed; she turned onto the highway and was free of the city. No one, she thought, can catch me now; they don’t even know which way I’m going.”

“They perceived at the same moment the change in the path and each knew then the other’s knowledge of it; Theodora took Eleanor’s arm and, afraid to stop, they moved on slowly, close together, and ahead of them the path widened and blackened and curved.”

“Without a word Theodora took up the quilt from the foot of the doctor’s bed and folded it around Eleanor and herself, and they moved close together, slowly in order not to make a sound. Eleanor, clinging to Theodora, deadly cold in spite of Theodora’s arms around her, thought, It knows my name, it knows my name this time. The pounding came up the stairs, crashing on each step.”

“I am making these directions so detailed because it is inadvisable to stop in Hillsdale to ask your way. The people there are rude to strangers and openly hostile to anyone inquiring about Hill House.”

“During the whole underside of her life, ever since her first memory, Eleanor had been waiting for something like Hill House. Caring for her mother, lifting a cross old lady from her chair to her bed, setting out endless little trays of soup and oatmeal, steeling herself to the filthy laundry, Eleanor had held fast to the belief that someday something would happen.”

″...‘you heard the story of Hill House and decided not to stay. How would you leave, tonight?’ He looked around at them again, quickly. ‘The gates are locked. Hill House has a reputation for insistent hospitality; it seemingly dislikes letting its guests get away. The last person who tried to leave Hill House in darkness—it was eighteen years ago, I grant you—was killed at the turn in the driveway, where his horse bolted and crushed him against the big tree. Suppose I tell you about Hill House, and one of you wants to leave? Tomorrow, at least, we could see that you got safely to the village.‘”

″‘Essentially,’ he went on slowly, ‘the evil is the house itself, I think. It has enchained and destroyed its people and their lives, it is a place of contained ill will. […].‘”

“It’s harder to burn down a house than you think,” Luke said.

“‘It watches,’ he added suddenly. ‘The house. It watches every move you make.’ And then, ‘My own imagination, of course.‘”

“Promise me absolutely that you will leave, as fast as you can, if you begin to feel the house catching at you.”

“I really am doing it, she thought, turning the wheel to send the car directly at the great tree at the curve of the driveway, I am really am doing it, I really am doing this all by myself, now, at last; this is me, I am really really really doing it by myself.”

“All of them stood in silence for a moment and looked at HELP ELEANOR COME HOME ELEANOR written in shaky red letters on the wallpaper over Theodora’s bed.”

“‘I’ve never been wanted anywhere,’ she said.”

“No stone lions for me, [Eleanor] thought, no oleanders; I have broken the spell of Hill House and somehow come inside. I am home, she thought, and stopped in wonder at the thought. I am home, I am home, she thought; now to climb.”