Gothic Romance, A Chill in Du Maurier's "Rebecca"
"Last night, I dreamed I went to Manderley again."
- Daphne Du Maurier - Rebecca
A story about a nameless woman - and so it goes. Only Hitchcock could pull it off reproducing such a clever book into movie format as he did some 2 years after publication. Since then, Rebecca sits on the shelves of fame as a gothic novel of mystery, romance and dream-like atmosphere too spooky to be real yet breathtaking enough to keep you licking your chops on the edge of your seat. Yet what makes this absolutely stunning masterpiece from 1938 a gothic tale? You won't exactly catch whiff of a blood-dripping vampire flittering across the pages. The gothic - is in the elements.
The suspense.
The sprawling mansion as setting, Manderley, is the heart of the gothic. In its walls is a horrifyingly rude and brusque old housekeeper who terrorizes Maxim's new wife due to an obsession of his dead first one. Add to that stormy weather, a raging sea, architectural pillars, sprawling stone spaces, and a home permeated with the grotesque essence of a first wife that mysteriously died, and you have gothic.
So where is the romance? The sex? The passion? Never shown, yet the new bride of Maxim, Lord of Manderley, is both meek and dotingly head over heels with her dashing new hubby. Yet the romantic undertone is quickly extinguished as her fresh hopes to act as Lady of Manderley is squashed by a complete lack of acceptance of Manderley staff and unexplained events.
The dark ending of the book as far more loomingly unpleasant than the one in the film makes it worth reading, even if you're not in it for the fog and jagged sea that reeks of 'something bad's about to hit the fan."
