How does Du Maurier create a successful opening to her novel Rebecca?
by
smasha123 (student)
How does Du Maurier create a successful opening to her novel ‘Rebecca’? As a reader we are immediately given an insight into a dream which the unknown narrator had the night before, detailing how they travelled around Manderley in ghost form. We discover this is the narrator’s old home, “I called in my dream to the lodge-keeper”, and a yearning and nostalgia is evident. ‘Home’ has connotations of being warm and welcoming, but the isolation from the home shows the opposite. ‘Padlock and a chain, ‘barred’, and ‘iron gate’ portray the extended metaphor of the narrator being cut off from their house. A sense of loss and mystery grows, heightened by the narrator only giving us vague details concerning their house. A feeling of loss seems to hang infused over the
beginning of the novel, with the narrator found in exile of Manderley – a place of beauty lying in ruins. Very strong imagery is created which paints a vivid picture in my mind of familiar things such as trees, described as ‘white, naked limbs.’ This suggests that the trees are bare and devoid of life, reminiscent of its surroundings. As each paragraph progresses, an extended description of all the narrator can see continues too – resulting in this feeling that something terrible is going to happen to the narrator due to the constant negative imagery. The narrative view of this ...
This is a preview of the whole essay
beginning of the novel, with the narrator found in exile of Manderley – a place of beauty lying in ruins. Very strong imagery is created which paints a vivid picture in my mind of familiar things such as trees, described as ‘white, naked limbs.’ This suggests that the trees are bare and devoid of life, reminiscent of its surroundings. As each paragraph progresses, an extended description of all the narrator can see continues too – resulting in this feeling that something terrible is going to happen to the narrator due to the constant negative imagery. The narrative view of this extract is written in an unknown 1st person who appears marginalised from society since it leaves me questioning why she’s dreaming of being in ghost form to visit her old home. The narrative view doesn’t fit the social context either – this everyday experience of dreaming appears to bring overwhelming emotions for the narrator. The growing characterisation of the narrator is significant, since as a reader I can feel the growing fear and immediacy as she unravels the destruction of her home lying in ruins. A creepy and spine tingling atmosphere is enforced by ‘long tenacious fingers’ encroaching the drive. This use of personification shows nature to be eerie and persistently uncontrollable, rather than a positive thing as usually thought. This is further supported by verbs such as ‘stealthy, insidious’, which suggests the narrator feels nature is out to get her and envelop her home, and she feels unfamiliar with everything that was once so memorable, as she ‘did not recognize’ anything. A semantic field of a monster like creature is constantly repeated, with words such as ‘skeleton, monster, gnarled’, and this negative way of portraying the setting confines to a typical gothic novel of dark, ominous landscapes for settings. The way we as a reader foreknowledge the destruction makes this sense of a terrible foreboding more real. Du Maurier structures the beginning cleverly, where we begin in the narrator’s dream of seeing her surroundings, and end being at her house. The first few paragraphs entail a very negative stance, but this becomes juxtaposed when the narrator is faced with her house, resulting in a very positive description. The tone of the extract is despondent, plaintive, and distant, since the narrator is in low spirits, seems sad and mournful, and doesn’t seem to be all there. ‘Our Manderley’ is the first indication that somebody else is involved in the novel, and this personal pronoun leaves me wanting to read on and find out who this person may be. The house is portrayed so beautifully, like ‘a jewel in the hollow of a hand’, the metaphor suggesting that it’s like hidden treasure. The use of sibilance, ‘secretive and silent’ shows that this house seemingly acts as a getaway and all is not as it seems. Two descriptors are used at a time, ‘narrow and unkept’, ‘twisting and turning’ etc, which starts to build up a rhythm. Conclusively, the most significant reason why this is a successful opening to the novel is simply because it creates confusion and suspense and makes me as a reader want to read on.