Rebecca By Daphne Du Maurier

 

"Rebecca" is a strong evocative and an exceptional endearing read filled with vivid world-building, strong characters but a relatively slow-moving plot mixed with gothic and suspense elements.

 The protagonist’s name isn’t shared throughout, though she ends up interacting with all the characters in the novel, big or small!

Hope it doesn't sound like gaslighting the readers, but I would seriously doubt the sanity of anyone condemning this novel at any level, including the floundering of the plot or the bulkiness of the novel. The cornucopia of the strong idiosyncratic characters, a plethora of atmospheric detailing and a major plot-twist supersedes any of the weaker attributes of the novel.

 

The novel predominantly revolves around "Manderley", an English town where the husband of the protagonist resides.

Daphne Du Maurier, has doused the book with profuse magic using her magic-wand of atmospheric-laden words, describing Manderley in vividity.

 

The novel begins on a note of nostalgia -

"Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again"

The protagonist is timid, gauche, diffident, inhibited and unsure about herself for major part of the novel and fraught with jealousy. She imbues with inferiority complex, keeps the apparition/image of the dead-Rebecca in a constant superior position. She allows her confidence to be haunted by Rebecca throughout!

 

" I know people are looking me up and down, wondering what sort of success I'm going to make of it. I can imagine them saying, "What on earth does Maxim see in her?"

You see, I know that all the time, whenever I meet anyone new, they are all thinking the same thing – How different she is to Rebecca."

 

The radical transformation in her persona is depicted post she comes to know the reason of Rebecca's death. She becomes confident and self-assured. Her doubts about the dissolution of her marriage give place to feelings of surety and love.

 

Maxim the Winter, the protagonist's husband is portrayed as cold and non-sentimental, very similar to Shakespeare’s Othello.

It is only towards the end of the novel; he becomes skittish due to sudden change of events and seeks for emotional support from the wife!

 

My favourite character who piqued interest in me and kept me hooked onto the novel is the sinister Mrs. Danvers.

For me the gothic character is not the dead Rebecca, but the very much living Mrs. Danvers.

When the protagonist meets her for the first time, the description used by the authoress sets up a perfect mysterious air around her-

 

“Someone advanced from the sea of faces, someone tall and gaunt, dressed in deep black, whose prominent cheek-bones and great, hollow eyes gave her a skull's face, parchment-white, set on a skeleton's frame. She came towards me, and I held out my hand, envying her for her dignity and her composure; but when she took my hand hers was limp and heavy, deathly cold, and it lay in mine like a lifeless thing.”

 

Mrs. Danvers is the housekeeper at Manderley, and her image is painted as someone too creepy, malevolent, sinister and in awe of Rebecaa. She cannot replace Rebecca with the new bride. Mrs. Danvers ends up insinuating the crestfallen, Mrs. De Winters, post the failed costume ball.

This is so wretched of Mr. Danvers that she even instigates the pitiable gauche protagonist to contemplate of a suicide ☹

 

“I won’t push you. I won’t stand by you. You can jump of your own accord. What’s the use of your staying here at Manderley? You’re not happy. Mr. de Winter doesn’t love you. There’s not much for you to live for, is there? Why don’t you jump now and have done with it? Then you won’t be unhappy any more.”

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I adore the fact, Daphne De Maurier flips the personalities of the husband and wife as the novel progresses. The husband transforming from a rude to a meek dependent goat, and the wife/protagonist from a skittish female to a self-assured sailor of family affairs.

 

All-in-all a 5-star for this gripping read.

I would like to visit this novel, whenever I would want to read about the atmospheric setting of Manderley and the sinister character perusal of Mrs. Danvers!