Haunted Houses: Section by section

Section 1 — Stanzas 1–2: the harmless phantoms

• Key lines explained:
  • "All houses wherein men have lived and died / Are haunted houses" — a surprising, universal definition: not some houses, but all lived-in houses. (2025 specimen Q6(ii): houses where people have lived and died and are revisited by the spirits of those who have passed on.)
  • "The harmless phantoms on their errands glide" — phantoms = ghosts; glide = move smoothly and silently. (2025 specimen Q1(ix))
  • "With feet that make no sound upon the floors" — silence; no footsteps, no terror.
  • "at the door-way, on the stair, / Along the passages" — places of passing through. (2025 specimen Q6(iii): doorways, stairs, passageways, halls.)
  • "Impalpable impressions on the air" — impalpable = cannot be touched; the ghosts are felt, not seen. Alliteration of i and p sounds.
  • "A sense of something moving to and fro" — vague, gentle presence.

Section 2 — Stanza 3: the crowded table

• Key lines explained:
  • "There are more guests at table, than the hosts / Invited" — the spirits of past family members join the meal.
  • "the illuminated hall / Is thronged with quiet, inoffensive ghosts" — thronged = crowded; inoffensive = harmless. The bright hall contrasts with the dark, traditional haunted house.
  • "As silent as the pictures on the wall" — simile; the portraits of ancestors hint at who the ghosts are.

Section 3 — Stanza 4: the speaker and the stranger

• Key lines explained:
  • "The stranger at my fireside cannot see / The forms I see, nor hear the sounds I hear" — the visitor lacks the speaker's memories.
  • "He but perceives what is; while unto me / All that has been is visible and clear" — what is = the present; all that has been = the past. (2025 specimen Q6(i): he can see and hear what the stranger cannot; the stranger perceives "what is" (the present), the narrator all that "has been" (the past). 2027 specimen Q1(vii): the speaker sees both the present and the past.)
  • The fireside suggests home, warmth and reflection.

Section 4 — Stanza 5: no title-deeds

• Key lines explained:
  • "We have no title-deeds to house or lands" — no real, permanent ownership.
  • "Owners and occupants of earlier dates / From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands" — the dead reach out from forgotten graves; personification and a vivid image.
  • "And hold in mortmain still their old estates" — mortmain = "dead hand", permanent ownership. (2025 specimen Q6(iv): the living cannot claim ownership of the houses and lands they occupy; previous owners and occupants from long ago, now dead, reach out from their graves to stake a claim.)
• Note: this image is the closest the poem comes to a "spooky" picture, yet its point is philosophical: possession is temporary.

Section 5 — Stanzas 6–8: the spirit-world and the human soul

• Key lines explained:
  • "The spirit-world around this world of sense / Floats like an atmosphere" — simile; the spiritual surrounds the physical.
  • "A vital breath of more ethereal air" — vital = life-giving; ethereal = heavenly, delicate.
  • "Our little lives are kept in equipoise / By opposite attractions and desires" — equipoise = balance between opposing forces.
  • "the instinct that enjoys, / And the more noble instinct that aspires" — earthly pleasure versus spiritual aspiration.
  • "These perturbations, this perpetual jar" — perturbations = disturbances; jar = clash; alliteration of p.
  • "an unseen star, / An undiscovered planet in our sky" — metaphor for the spirit-world: invisible, but known by its influence.

Section 6 — Stanzas 9–10: the bridge of light

• Key lines explained:
  • "as the moon from some dark gate of cloud / Throws o'er the sea a floating bridge of light" — the shining path of moonlight on water.
  • "Across whose trembling planks our fancies crowd / Into the realm of mystery and night" — our imaginations travel along it into the unknown.
  • "So from the world of spirits there descends / A bridge of light, connecting it with this" — the second half of the extended simile: a spiritual bridge joins the two worlds.
  • "O'er whose unsteady floor, that sways and bends, / Wander our thoughts above the dark abyss" — the bridge is uncertain, but our thoughts can cross it; the abyss is the mystery of death.