Dolly ~ Susan Hill (2012)

After the great impression caused by The Woman in Black, Dolly was the second of Susan Hill’s novels that I read and the reaction, like her most famous work, is a curious tale which draws on the horror conventions used during the Victorian era to create a chilling ghost story that entertains and terrifies. In The Woman in Black, Hill draws on the senses to explore the terror caused by the sounds of a rocking chair and in this story, the sound of rustling is used for the same effect. In the story, the doll comes to life and its activity is recorded through the sound. This is demonstrated clearly from the prologue to the story and is a clear re-indication of Hill’s use of the senses as the primary target for terror and the quickest way to place the story in the reader’s memory. The story focuses on Edward, an orphan who spends his summer with his Aunt Kestrel and cousin, Leonora. Leonora, to contrast the quiet and polite Edward, is a spoilt, spiteful character and her punishment for her behaviour is the eternal haunting by Dolly which is marked by the sound of its rustling when it is near. It is not until Leonora is fully grown that she realises the extent of the haunting and regrets her actions and as this is an exceedingly genius yet terrifying metaphor, I will not detail further and leave it to the Dolly readers the near-future to discover. Perhaps an extreme example of a cautionary tale, the exaggerated cost of bad behaviour acts as a stronger reiteration of the story’s message and where this could be an example of a children’s fable, the disturbing imagery allocates this novella for an older readership. Edward however is not as interesting as a protagonist; unlike Arthur Kipps, Edward has not active role in the story, he merely watches and records what he witnesses. He is similar to a Dickensian protagonist as action happens without his contribution and it is this convention along with the moors setting, grand manor houses and eccentric older relations which sets the story firmly in the Victorian era, narratively and stylistically. In Dolly, Susan Hill presents the darkness of youth which is similar to Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw but extracts the ambiguity to concentrate the source of evil within Dolly. Through the story, Hill subverts connotations of innocence associated with china dolls and as a good ghost story should accomplish, the reader adapts their perspective to the author’s dark view and after reading the story, china dolls do not evoke joy, but incite fear.