The Haunting of Hill House: Gothic Family Dynamic

While in the readings of The Fall of the House of Usher, The Yellow Wallpaper, and The Little Room, all the portrayals of family were highly negative, the family dynamics in The Haunting of Hill House are presented in both a positive and negative light.  In the story, it appears that the familial relationships between those "created" families versus that blood-related/marital families are much stronger. The bond between Dr. Montague, Eleanor, Theodora, and Luke appear to be much stronger than each individual character's relationship with their own families.  Each of these four characters come from various sorts of broken families. As we well know, Eleanor outlived both her parents, and her relationship with her sister is near nonexistent, leaving her isolated and much of a loner. We learn that Luke has no mother, and the family he does have regards him as nothing more than a thief, leaving him also alienated from any intimate familial ties. Dr. Montague and his wife seem to have a very strange marriage. Their relationship seems to be dominated by Mrs. Montague's overbearing personality, and strained by her suspicious relationship with their butler, Arthur. As for Theodora, there is no mention of any family at all. All we know is that she lives with a friend, but her going to Hill House was the result of a huge fight with this friend, also leaving Theodora with no kind of familial ties. Perhaps it is because all these characters come from broken families that they meld so well together to form their own family. There is much playful banter between Eleanor and Theodora that they are long lost cousins, and we see the two interact very much like sisters. Dr. Montague plays the role of a father. On page 110, a scenario is described to us that sounds very much like a father watching his children play. "Theodora and Eleanor and Luke...lay on the lawn near the doctor, eating them, staining their hands and mouths; like children, the doctor told them, looking up with amusement from his notes."