Explain how the author develops the theme that home is a joyful and safe place with evidence from the text.

In "The Ambitious Guest" the family shown living in the isolated house is a picture of happiness: a mother and father, young girl and small child, and elderly grandmother. It's meant as a straightforward depiction without irony, without any dark secret as might be expected from a Hawthorne story if we know his work. The house is open to strangers, who walk right in and are accepted with warmth. The inclusion of the guest does nothing to disrupt this picture, as he bonds with them immediately and finds that they sympathize with his wish to achieve one great thing and then die. The young man does not seem to value life itself—which is unusual—but only the quality of being remembered for an act or acts accomplished in life.
The ultimate message of the story, however, is that not only is the process of life the guest does not value ephemeral; it is random as well. No one could know that the avalanche would strike the very spot they ran to for safety, and spare the house they thought would be destroyed. It's arguable that by this outcome Hawthorne meant to convey that "ambition"—the seeking of something beyond the comfort and security of what we have—is the thing that kills us. But his theme seems an even darker one: that whatever human beings plan and secure for themselves—a supposedly safe home, clothes for burial as the grandmother has, an idea for accomplishment like that of the ambitious guest—all of this can come crashing to ruin at any moment, and regardless of our will to survive and achieve, there is nothing we can do to prevent such a random outcome.

The author of the short story “The Ambitious Guest” starts by explaining the location of the home. The home is situated in a “cold dangerous spot” near a steep mountain. It is in the Notch of the White Hills which is referred to as the “bleakest spot of all New England,” with a weather that is exceedingly cold in the winter and has a sharp wind throughout the year. Yet, the interior of the house is safe and happy. The hearth in the house has a roaring fire that expels any cold, and the people of the house even laugh at each other’s jokes in spite of the scary sound made outside by rolling stones.
Indeed, the parents, children, and grandmother are each defined, using various adjectives, as being very happy: the parents’ faces have a “sober gladness,” the oldest girl is “the image of happiness,” and the grandmother is the “image of happiness grown old.” The house doubles up as a tavern, where lodgers only pay for food and accommodation. When a young male traveler enters the house, he says, “Ah, this fire is the right thing, especially when there is such a pleasant circle around it.” The author builds the theme that the house is a joyful and safe place by contrasting its warm interior with the cold exterior.