The Night the Ghost Got In

Whether real or not, ghosts have a very real presence within the context of the narrative. The titular ghost is a symbol for both the threat of the unknown and the lack of meaning prevalent in absurdism. There are also ghosts in the metaphorical sense in the things that haunt the characters: the Civil War and the Thurbers’ fears and paranoias. Like society’s search for meaning in the wake of the first World War, the Thurbers are searching for the source of the noise that they hear downstairs. This again is a breeding ground for absurdism in the text. In contradiction with what they know they hear, they cannot see or find evidence of the perceived threat of the ghost, causing the Thurbers to respond in increasingly irrational ways. The naming of the ghost as “the ghost” acts as a level of meaning-making on Thurber’s part. In the face of the unknown, Thurber can only conceive of the source of the noise as a form of the supernatural.

What Thurber tells the officers about the zither symbolizes the family’s absurdity and connects to the subjective nature of truth in the story.