I’m several days late on this review, but I have been a bit busy with a new project that I hope to be able to tell you about in a few days, and the time I’ve spent working on that kept me from finishing the book until this weekend, but I think it will be worth it when this new project is ready to launch. For now, let’s talk about Rebecca
“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderly again.”
The beginning of this classic is really the ending, an epilogue as an introduction. The dark mood, the sense of dread that is established in the dream sets the stage for the entire novel.
For anyone who may not be familiar with the story, the narrator (who is unnamed) is a young woman who goes from being a companion for an obnoxious wealthy American woman vacationing in Europe to becoming the wife of Maximilian de Winter, an older, wealthy mysterious man whose first wife, Rebecca, died the previous year. The two women couldn’t be more polar opposites. While Rebecca was outgoing and gregarious, the new Mrs. de Winter is shy almost to the point of being antisocial. Rebecca commanded attention; new Mrs. de W craves anonymity. Rebecca feared nothing; new Mrs. de W fears everything, including the memory of Rebecca.
This is one I wish I could read again for the first time. Knowing the ending as I read it again I missed the real sense of mystery that grabbed me so before, but the writing is close to perfect. I’ve said it before about some of the classics, but I love the language. It isn’t the same as in Jane Eyre
There were things about it that affected me differently reading it as an adult than when I read it before. As in Jane Eyre, I cringed a little with the idea of a young woman marrying a much older man with such obvious secrets that no one will talk about. I tried to set this problem aside and enjoy the story for what it was, but it wasn’t easy. It was a difficult balance between the wonderful writing and a twenty-first century perspective on a relationship so obviously dysfunctional. I think this quote of Maxim from Chapter 16 aptly illustrates his patronizing opinion of his wife as well as the degree to which he prefers her to remain ignorant of his past:
“A husband is not so very different from a father after all. There is a certain type of knowledge I prefer you not to have. It’s better kept under lock and key. So that’s that. And now eat up your peaches and don’t ask me any more questions, or I shall have to put you in the corner.”
I guess if you’re a forty-year-old man married to a twenty-year-old girl in the early twentieth century, you can say things like that.
***Spoiler Alert*** It also bothered me tremendously that when the narrator finds out her husband shot and killed his first wife her response is to help him cover up his crime. What?? Call me overly sensitive, but how does a woman in any century find this acceptable behavior in a husband? ***Spoiler Alert and Sermon Over***
I realize, of course, that this was written in a different time and that it is a mystery, and while the major problem I had with the relationship between Maxim and Wife #2 made me uncomfortable, it is still a classic worth reading. She does achieve a significant amount of maturity by the end of the story…which is in the first chapter…and I was glad to see that. I have sometimes criticized others for judging people in the past by today’s standards, so I want to give both Mrs. de W #2 and the author the benefit of the doubt and encourage you to read the story as the thriller it is meant to be. I would also highly recommend Alfred Hitchcock’s 1940 movie version
If you’ve read this one I’d love to know what you thought of it. You can also read other reviews at 5 Minutes for Books.
No Classics Bookclub next month, but I’m excited that they have listed The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Encourage one another,
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Great review! I too wish I could read it for the first time but hadn’t realized it until I heard you say so…
Thanks for joining us!
I can’t wait to read this one!
Loved your review. I too struggled with the age difference and the ‘revelation’…but kept telling myself, ‘it must be the times in which it was written because this wouldn’t make it in today’s world’. Thanks!