When Daphne du Maurier published “Rebecca” in 1938, it was labelled a romantic Gothic novel. In the dreamy opening pages, the nameless young narrator writes from her present life in exile with her husband. She does not say they are homesick, but her picture of the English woods they have left behind is heartbreaking. Then she recounts how she first met and married the wealthy and much older widower Maxim de Winter, how she returned with him to Manderley, the ancient family seat. The new bride hoped to preside over an affectionate family, a house filled with children and dogs. Instead, she falls under the shadow of de Winter's magnetic and beautiful first wife, Rebecca, and the sinister housekeeper, Mrs Danvers.
For much of the novel, Mrs Danvers stalks the young bride. She hounds her for breaking a curio, she tells her how Rebecca ordered her menus or did her flowers. She forces her to walk in the dead woman's footsteps and then blames her for it. The bride proves embarrassingly unfit to take charge.
The novel has the regulation shrouded rooms, half-told histories and unburied bodies, but it is in a class of its own for its psychological honesty about marriage between a very young woman and a powerful man. When she first sees him she is reminded of cloaked men lurking in medieval alleys and soon after, standing with him on a cliff, she wonders whether he might be mad. Once they settle down in Manderley she realizes he is now comfortably at home, whereas she must fend for herself. He can't understand why she doesn't manage the servants or stand up to inquisitive neighbours. This narrator never pities herself. She is ironic, even humorous, and crystal clear about who is master and how she must get on. The story unfolds quickly, and the emotional tension never slackens. The reader is always on edge.
Tension turns into fear when the young bride finds out how Rebecca died and realizes that the death will now be investigated. Suddenly, that funny, lost look is gone from her face, Maxim says, and she has grown up. Mrs de Winter no longer sways with her husband's moods. Instead, she decides what their story will be. She conspires, she compromises, and she goes with him into exile.
So they will live like Jane Eyre and her blind, humbled Rochester in a solitude of two, but Mrs. de Winter enjoys none of Jane's certainties. Maxim de Winter expresses no remorse. He is never exposed. Does he even love his wife, or does he only want her to stay with him? With her by his side, he can convince others of his innocence. Without her, his case is shaky. In marrying a plain and friendless young woman, had he meant from the first to buy his innocence back again? In their joint exile, will he not remain the master? The mansion ends in ashes, like many a Gothic pile, but the man will always haunt us.
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