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| This is the Dutch cover. I love that photograph! |
Daphne Du
Maurier was born in 1907 in a famous
family, her father was a well-known actor and her grandfather was a writer. She
herself was passionate about writing from a young age and was determined to
earn her own living with writing, so she could be independent.
She was
proud of her French roots, was shy in company and loved Cornwall from the
moment she first came there when her parents bought a house there. Here
she began to write her first books.
Daphne
married Frederick Browning, a soldier, who would later play an important role
during WWII. Together they had three children, the youngest son was Daphne’s
favorite.
When her
husband was stationed in Egypt, Daphne went with him, although it was hard for
her to be away from her beloved Cornwall. That is why she began with what
finally would be her most successful book; Rebecca. The critics were full of
praise and the book had record sales.
This
success gave her the opportunity to rent the mansion Menabilly, a house she was
fascinated by from the first moment she had seen it. The estate Manderley from
Rebecca was also based on this house.
She would
live here for more than 20 years, and even when her husband lived in London
after the war because of his position at court, Daphne refused to leave
Menabilly. This was the place where she could write and her love for this house
was greater than her love for other things, or even almost, other people.
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| Daphne and her children at Menabilly |
Critics did
not always take her books seriously. Often she was just seen as a writer of
romantic novels. This did hurt a little, but it never deterred her from writing
new books and exploring new genres and often to shock her readers with her
macabre stories.
Manderley forver is the fictionalized biography of Daphne Du
Maurier by the French-British author Tatiana
de Rosnay.
The other
book I read by Tatiana de Rosnay was
Her name was Sarah and I thought that
was absolute crap, so I was a little hesitant to buy this one. However, Daphne
Du Maurier is a fascinating subject and I took the risk.
And I must
admit, it was 100% better than I had thought. Of course, the writing style is a
bit overly melodramatic every now and then, but on the whole I thought it was a
very good and pleasant book. It reads like a novel and this is done very well,
Daphne Du Maurier, with all her contradictions and peculiarities, really comes
to life.
Tatiana de Rosnay tells about Daphne’s childhood with an
overbearing father and a mother who did not really care for her, she also tells
about the marriage between Daphne and Frederick and the affair Daphne had as a
young woman with a female teacher at the French boarding school she attended
and she does this with a lot of feeling for her subject.
There is
also a lot of attention how Daphne began to write and how her novels were written
and this is very interesting.
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| Daphne du Maurier when she was older. |
Every now
and then you read a chapter on how Tatiana
de Rosnay is looking for remains of Daphne’s life, for example by visiting
the houses she lived in and this is a fun little extra.
If you want
to read an academic biography with footnotes, then you should leave this book
alone, because this is too much like a novel (with a lot of speculation about
what Daphne Du Maurier thought and said).
But if you
want to read a very pleasant book about the life of Daphne Du Maurier, that
actually does have good research, then pick this one up, because you will not
be disappointed.
Manderley forever did awaken my interest in the other novels by
Daphne Du Maurier, and that is something I really like in a book, if it is capable
of making you want to read more.
Published
in 2015
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