ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines a broad range of subjects, theories, sources, and perspectives regarding house and home. It discusses the specific subjects of homelessness, homecoming, and the roles and representations of houses and homes in select examples of literature. The chapter also discusses how house and home have presented a diversity of content, illustrated by works from a variety of literary traditions and periods because of unique, immaterial evidence of the cultural and ontological roles of house and home. The journey from the home of childhood and search for one's own home entails crossing the threshold to the unknown and the unpredictable, and entering an ontological condition of homelessness. The house and home play roles in describing the human condition, relations, and psychology, not only symbolically or metaphorically, but in their physical presences and experiences. The depth and breadth of its roles and illustrates how architecture can affect emotions, materialize psyches, and express desires.
