Rebecca – Daphne Du Maurier

Rebecca is one of those novels that’s been sitting on my TBR shelf for a while now and I can’t explain what made me go over there the other day and pick it up and begin to read. All I can say is that from the first page there was no question of putting down this novel until I had finished it!

When the novel opens (with quite a famous line, apparently) our narrator is describing a dream and it is clear that the dream is taking place well after the events that will shape the novel. When she takes us to the beginning of her story, she is a young woman in the French Riviera, acting as a companion to a wealthy but rather boorish and tasteless woman. She’s an orphan with no real prospects, plain and frumpily dressed, socially shy and awkward. The perfect companion for the very overbearing Mrs Van Hopper.

When Van Hopper, a social climber in the extreme, spies the widowed Max de Winter she engineers an introduction. Unfortunately for her, she then falls ill, leaving our narrator to spend some time with with him during the day while Mrs Van Hopper languishes in bed. The handsome and rich Mr de Winter, owner of Manderley, a famous estate set near the sea in England, is captivating to our unworldly narrator and she is soon in love with him. When Mrs Van Hopper recovers and declares that she wishes to travel to America with her daughter, the heroine is distraught. She finds a way to see de Winter to say goodbye and is stunned when he proposes that she return with him to Manderley instead – as his wife.

It is only once they arrive at Manderley does the narrator truly realise how difficult things will be. The whole impressive and opulent estate is still run in the exact same way as the late Mrs de Winter ran it and everywhere our narrator looks she is reminded of the confident, beautiful Rebecca who made this place a home before her. Rebecca, the social butterfly who entertained with aplomb, who was beloved by all. Rebecca whose rooms are still kept like a shrine to her by the housekeeper, Mrs Danvers. Rebecca, who still seems to hold Max’s heart in her hands, even nearly a year after she is gone. Rebecca, who drowned in the bay just near the house.

Although the narrator and new Mrs de Winter tries hard to fit in, she lacks the confidence and social adeptness to pull off paying visits to locals and receiving them. She knows that people must be wondering where Max found her and why he married her at all, after being married to such a beautiful creature as Rebecca. The housekeeper, Mrs Danvers, is openly cold and reminds her at every opportunity that she doesn’t live up to the standard set by the first Mrs de Winter. The new Mrs de Winter retreats, leaving the household to run itself until a ship running aground in Manderley Bay brings forth a startling discovery that will change the lives of all at Manderley, leading us back to that first sentence.

As far as I’m concerned, this book has only one flaw and that is I have nothing to call the narrator as she is never named to the reader. When reviewing, it’s very awkward to keep writing ‘the narrator’ or ‘our heroine’ etc all the time, but that really is my only nitpick with this novel! After the intriguing first chapter and a half, when the novel goes back to the beginning of the story, it starts off slowly, a gentle burn as we are introduced to our characters. Although the pacing in this section is quite slow, it’s certainly not boring and as soon as the newly married de Winter’s arrive back at Manderley, things really pick up.

The characters are excellent – our shy and plain narrator who knows exactly what she is, and what she isn’t. She’s an honest descriptor of herself, and of what is around her. Max is the quintessential brooding Byronic style hero and my only quibble with him is that as man, we’re not shown much of his actual character. We see him through our narrator’s eyes of course and as she borderline hero worships him, and accepts the mystery and misery of him, we must as well. The servants are well drawn, the faithful butler-type who is polite but curious and borderline judging, the eerily sinister Mrs Danvers who manipulates our poor heroine quite horribly. A reader can see disaster coming a mile off on several occasions (most notably the ball they hold at Manderley) and it’s hard to stop yourself screaming a warning at the book when the hapless narrator, believing Mrs Danvers is coming around at last, takes her advice.

The house is a living, breathing character itself – large and sprawling, a veritable maze of rooms that the second Mrs de Winter has trouble negotiating. When she learns that an entire wing has been opened up for her and Max upon their return, she is naturally curious about why they are in new rooms and where Max’s old rooms were. She is soon shown the first Mrs de Winter’s opulent quarters, her things are all still untouched, her slippers still rest by the bed as though she may return to pop her feet into them at any moment. The bloodless Mrs Danvers, housekeeper and devotee of Rebecca is a constant reminder to our narrator that things here will not change. They will go on honouring the late Rebecca as the true mistress of Manderley. Our narrator sits in Rebecca’s morning room, at her desk, using her pen. She sits at her space at the dinner table, eating off her plate.

Beautifully atmospheric, this gloomy gothic novel will have you turning the pages frantically, trying to figure out just what is the real mystery behind Rebecca. I can honestly say for me that when it was revealed, I nearly fell off my chair. I had my suspicions about what was really happening but I was so far off the mark that I might as well not have even guessed. And I love a novel that can take my thoughts and laugh at them and basically tell me ‘you have no idea where I’m going, so here is a complete head-f**k to enjoy!’ And even though I was already loving the book, I fell even more in love with it after that.

I’ve never read Jane Eyre – a glaring oversight in my literary history I’m sure! I am aiming to read it next, given the comparisons drawn between it and Rebecca, when I’ve finished the other books I’ve currently reading. I sort of feel as though I am perhaps doing this backwards, reading Rebecca first and it will be interesting for me to review them that way.

Rebecca is definitely a novel for me, that lives up to the hype it has built up over the past 70-odd years. I can understand why so many people count it among their favourites – amazing narrative voice, excellent plot, really engaging pace. I’ll be looking for more Du Maurier novels in the future, I want to see some more examples of her work.

9/10

Book #32 of 2011

Rebecca is one of the novels in 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die and qualifies for the challenge I am undertaking this year to read (hopefully) 10 novels from the book that we currently already own. Rebecca is the first novel I have completed for this challenge so far!

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