One of the greatest terrors of the human mind is death. Death hovers over us, holding a ticking clock which counts down the time that we have left before we join him. Subconsciously, all humans can hear this clock from the moment we truly understand who Death represents- the end. This understanding guides our actions while we are alive. Humans try to be the best they can in order to be able to reflect back in the end with a sense of accomplishment. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story, “The Hollow of Three Hills,” is an example of the reflection that humans go through before giving ourselves to Death. The Lady has died and in the state of limbo (the border between Life and Death) she meets the Crone. The Crone represents a mythological creature,
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This is the “appointment” that every person has in the limbo state before meeting Death. The Lady, “pale and troubled,” was in the “fullest bloom of her years” when she died. She has done some actions in her life which she desires to see the consequences. The Crone takes the form of a corrupted Psychopomp. Psychopomps are mythological creatures who guides souls to the afterlife. The most commonly known Psychopomps are Hermes from Greek mythology and Anubis from Egyptian mythology (Strong). She is corrupted because Psychopomps are not supposed to judge the souls for their actions in the living. The Crone clearly enjoys the pain and suffering of The Lady as she “[chuckles] to herself” after the visions (Hawthorne 4). Their meeting place, “three little hills [that] stood near each other,” is where The Lady’s soul will meet Death. After the reflection, her soul will descend into the “hollow …show more content…
The Lady is talking about her child. In the third vision, she does not hear the child voice. When the narrator says, “[she] left her child to die,” there are two possibilities that could have happen. The first one could be that she died - either from suicide of sickness- and literally left her child to actually die. If it was lechery, the husband was wouldn’t want to care for a child that he didn’t father. Since he is in the “Mad House,” he wouldn’t be able to care for the child anyways. The parents of the daughter would see the child as a disgrace and would refuse to it. With no one to care for it, the child could have actually died. The second possibility is similar to the first except The Lady actually abandoned her child by committing suicide - whether it was from the committed sin of lechery or not. Again the husband and parents were not able to care for the child. The reader can rule out the husband as the murder of either The Lady or the child. If the husband did commit murder her would have been executed and not sent to the “Mad House.” So The Lady or the child could be in the coffin. It is more likely the child (if the child is dead) because if The Lady did commit a sin, it is more than unlikely that there would be a formal funeral held for
This is the “appointment” that every person has in the limbo state before meeting Death. The Lady, “pale and troubled,” was in the “fullest bloom of her years” when she died. She has done some actions in her life which she desires to see the consequences. The Crone takes the form of a corrupted Psychopomp. Psychopomps are mythological creatures who guides souls to the afterlife. The most commonly known Psychopomps are Hermes from Greek mythology and Anubis from Egyptian mythology (Strong). She is corrupted because Psychopomps are not supposed to judge the souls for their actions in the living. The Crone clearly enjoys the pain and suffering of The Lady as she “[chuckles] to herself” after the visions (Hawthorne 4). Their meeting place, “three little hills [that] stood near each other,” is where The Lady’s soul will meet Death. After the reflection, her soul will descend into the “hollow …show more content…
The Lady is talking about her child. In the third vision, she does not hear the child voice. When the narrator says, “[she] left her child to die,” there are two possibilities that could have happen. The first one could be that she died - either from suicide of sickness- and literally left her child to actually die. If it was lechery, the husband was wouldn’t want to care for a child that he didn’t father. Since he is in the “Mad House,” he wouldn’t be able to care for the child anyways. The parents of the daughter would see the child as a disgrace and would refuse to it. With no one to care for it, the child could have actually died. The second possibility is similar to the first except The Lady actually abandoned her child by committing suicide - whether it was from the committed sin of lechery or not. Again the husband and parents were not able to care for the child. The reader can rule out the husband as the murder of either The Lady or the child. If the husband did commit murder her would have been executed and not sent to the “Mad House.” So The Lady or the child could be in the coffin. It is more likely the child (if the child is dead) because if The Lady did commit a sin, it is more than unlikely that there would be a formal funeral held for