“The House of the Seven Gables” (post 1) by Nathaniel Hawthorne (post 5): Clifford may have unacknowledged multiple personality like Dickens’ Dr. Manette 

A third of the way into this 1851 novel, a character has been introduced who reminds me of Dr. Manette in Dickens’ 1859 A Tale of Two Cities. Both characters are released after many years in prison. Dr. Manette had a clear-cut case of multiple personality disorder (search “manette”).

The Hawthorne character, Clifford Pyncheon, the guest of his sister and cousin in the house of the seven gables, has just been released from a long imprisonment for a murder he did not commit. In his introductory chapter, he has radical, moment-to-moment changes in his personality, which may mean that he is switching from one personality to another.

“Continually, as we may express it, he faded away out of his place; or, in other words, his mind and consciousness took their departure, leaving his wasted, gray, and melancholy figure—a substantial emptiness…Again, after a blank moment, there would be a flickering…It betokened that his spiritual part had returned, and was doing its best…to light up intellectual lamps…” (1, p. 105).

“In a little while, the guest became sensible of the fragrance of the yet untasted coffee. He quaffed it eagerly…a certain fine temper of being was now…betrayed—of which it was the function to deal with all beautiful and enjoyable things. In a character where it should exist as the chief attribute, it would bestow on its possessor an exquisite taste, and an enviable susceptibility of happiness…Such a man would have nothing to do with sorrow…” (1, pp. 107-108).

“But the several moods of feeling…through which he passed, occurring in so brief an interval of time, had evidently wearied the stranger…He appeared to become grosser; almost cloddish. If aught of interest or beauty…had heretofore been visible in this man, the beholder might now begin to doubt it, and to accuse his own imagination of deluding him…” (1, pp. 111-112).

Comment

At first, you may think Clifford just needed some coffee, which he eagerly drinks. His mood brightens. He appreciates beauty and enjoyable things. But his mood and attitude is soon so changed, you wonder if you had imagined it.

Puzzling inconsistency (search it) may be a clue to undiagnosed, unacknowledged, multiple personality. But I am not expecting Hawthorne to be as clear about Clifford as Dickens is about Dr. Manette.

1. Nathaniel Hawthorne. The House of the Seven Gables [1851]. Edited with an Introduction and Notes by Michael Davitt Bell. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2009.