31 pages • 1 hour read
Nathaniel HawthorneThe Wives of the Dead
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1832A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
House
The house where Margaret, Mary, and their two husbands live is modest, if two-storied, its contents plain but orderly. It keeps with the youthfully modest fortunes of the two men and the careful housekeeping of the wives. Upstairs is a parlor with chairs, a table, a fireplace, and a lantern. A hinged window opens out onto the front of the house and looks down at the front entrance. Through this window, both Margaret and Mary separately listen to reports that their husbands are still alive.
On each side of the parlor is a bedroom, one used by Margaret and her husband, the other by Mary and her mate. The doors to each room remain open during the night of the story, so that the women can look in on each other from their own beds to make sure that their housemate is safe on this evening after a great tragedy. The house represents the women’s togetherness during their grief, and, unbeknownst to either of them, they are also together in celebration. Mary traverses the parlor to sit with Margaret after learning her husband is alive, not knowing that Margaret is celebrating similar news in her sleep.
Lantern
A lantern illuminates the house’s parlor when the two sisters-in-law, mourning the sudden deaths of their husbands, share a meal before the parlor fireplace. At bedtime, the lantern flickers after the fireplace has been extinguished; this illumination serves as an upstairs night light. It also casts flickering shadows across the parlor, which add to the gloom of the sisters’ recent widowhood. Each woman awakens and brings the lantern to the parlor window, where each hears—or perhaps merely dreams—good news about their husbands from a messenger out front. Glowing through the night, the lantern symbolizes the enduring love between the sisters and, at the window, a gleam of hope about their husbands.
Moonlight
Though rain patters down on the house and drowns the mood of the newly widowed sisters-in-law, it later gives way to a moonlit sky. The moonlight accords with hopeful news that Mary’s husband may still be alive. The pattern of moonlight and shadow on the landscape suggests, however, that there’s a great deal of uncertainty in Mary’s mind; its light-and-dark pattern, shifting and changing, also puts forth the possibility that Mary is asleep and merely dreaming rather than at the window looking out at the moonlight.
Rain
Early in the story, gloomy twilight gives way to rain. The steady shower upon the house represents the down-pouring of an unrelenting tragedy on the family within. It also sets the gloomy mood of the tale. The rain clouds later lift, suggesting the hope that some or all of the disaster may be relieved by good news.
The Props of Despair
Several items in the wives’ house serve as symbols of the women’s characters and shifting moods. The house itself is modest, its furnishings simple but orderly; this suggests youth, humility, and shared ideals, which make their loss all the more tragic. A lantern keeps watch over the upstairs parlor and bedrooms. Its light signals hope and reassurance; the young ladies rely on it to help them monitor each other as they try to sleep through this worst of all nights. They each bring the lantern with them to the window, its light casting hopeful rays as, successively, they peer down toward the doorway below, where each sees a man who bring good news.
Anonymous Husbands and Named Messengers
The disaster centers on the near-simultaneous deaths of the women’s husbands, yet these men remain unnamed—they’re referred to only as “a sailor and a landsman” (4). It’s as if the dead, shorn of life, also lose the names that connect them to society. The men’s anonymity also signals that the most important relationship in the story is the close, sisterly love shared by Mary and Margaret.
On the other hand, the two men who bring news to the house are named. The first is Goodman Parker, an innkeeper whose first name bespeaks his positive report to Margaret and his diligence in bringing the news to her even at a late hour. The second visitor is Stephen, a sailor and ex-suitor of Mary who also brings happy news yet whose last name isn’t mentioned. Although Mary clearly is accustomed to addressing him simply by his first name, there’s a sense that he’s no longer important enough in her life even to have a last name.
Related Titles
By Nathaniel Hawthorne
