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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Expect a mystery novel, but not answers , March 18, 2007
I read Sally Beauman's Rebecca's Tale after it was reissued in trade paperback under the Harper-Collins "History" imprint. This line of books has sought to capitalize on the recent renaissance of "revisionist" fiction and sequels to popular and classic works alike, from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (Janet Aylmer's "Darcy's Story") to Bronte's Jane Eyre (Emma Tennant's "Thornfield Hall"). I understand publishers' interest in such works: they revisit the characters and plotlines of well-loved books that have proven themselves worldwide bestsellers; from a business perspective, a re-working of any Austen, Bronte, or Du Maurier novel is, to borrow the phraseology of an 80's teen flick, a "sure thing." Both publishers and potential readers of this type of novel should be aware that there is a good chance many readers will find literary reworkings of classic novels at best unsatisfactory and, at worst, sacrilegious. It's analogous to screen adaptations of classic and/or bestselling novels--potential viewership is high, but so is the chance that those viewers will object strenuously to perceived inaccuracies or misrepresentations of the original author's work.
One might think that Sally Beauman has a better chance for success, considering that the main character of her novel is one who was developed in Du Maurier's original work only through hearsay and piecemeal deductions strung together by a third-party narrator. Yet readers have conjured up their own vision of what Rebecca de Winter would have been like had Du Maurier introduced her to us in the proverbial flesh, and Beauman's characterization may or may not be what they had in mind. Interestingly, Bauman does NOT introduce us to Rebecca, either--in fact, RT makes use of the same oblique characterization techniques as Du Maurier's novel, offering insight into Rebecca via the "off-scene" media of journal entries and third party personal testimonies.
RT is a piece of detective fiction. Since I am not a frequent reader of mysteries, I can't say whether the novel fulfills all the expectations of that genre, however, RT certainly pulls at the reader with the intensity of a "who-done-it," and at many points comes close to succeeding. The writer deluges us with hundreds, indeed potentially thousands of details--of family lineages and ancestry, of affairs hinted at or revealed outright, of paternity disputes, childhood traumas, "mysterious" would-be suicides, and dozens of personal testimonies, each potentially unreliable or tainted by natural human bias. Much of this information is compelling enough to draw the reader along, producing a "page-turner" of sorts; I don't use this in the conventional sense of a thrilling or wildly entertaining novel but, rather, in a more literal fashion. The reader has invested a bit of time and effort in wading through all these details, so it's only natural that we should feel compelled to get to the "good part," the natural denouement that imparts a feeling of tied-up ends and narrative coherency. And it is a relief when we learn anything concrete at all--for example, Terence Gray's origins and motivations.
Trouble is, as some have already noted, the ending is something of an anti-climax, and it is not at all clear that the aforementioned legions of details have resolved themselves enough for the book to end.
(**SEMI-SPOILER*) It's difficult for me to pin down why the ending feels so tacked-on; on the Rebecca mystery front, it may have something to do with incomplete journal entries and unconvincing and faintly ludicrous interviews with a character introduced (or at least brought forward) at the last minute. A character who has (understandably) been obsessed with Rebecca's family ancestry abruptly gives up the hunt and shrugs his shoulders over the whole thing. On the Julyan family front (relating to those characters Beauman has made up), professions of love seems to come "out of left field" and appear thrown in just to elicit one narrator's life epiphanies.
(*Semi-SPOILER over now*)
In terms of characterization, Beauman's Rebecca is sufficiently arresting; I think the reader gets an idea of why Du Maurier's other characters would have had such strong reactions to her. Rebecca's journal entries are written in a style completely different from the detective-procedural, straightforward, nit-picky details of the other three narrators' sections. Rebecca's journals include the most self-consciously "literary" language, with the most artful arrangements of phrases, and the most powerful. The only thing I dodn't buy was that a woman who had had no formal education could write so eloquently, although the influence of Shakespeare cannot be underestimated, I suppose.
I think you will learn nothing about Maxim de Winter that will contribute to your understanding of either Du Maurier's character or Beauman's version. Beauman does, however, subvert expectations of the second Mrs. de Winter in way that is sure to displease literal-minded readers who viewed the original novel's character as a reliable and an emotionally transparent (thus, sympathetic) narrator.
The homosexuality plotlines should surprise no one who has read any nonfiction work of or about Du Maurier, who was herself actively bisexual. No, Beauman has done well to weave the subject into her characters' lives, however, she does so to an unnecessary degree; I believe having four homosexual and bisexual characters overemphasizes the Du Maurier autobiographical connection, and detracts from the one character whose bisexuality actually contributes to our understanding of the de Winter mystery-tragedy.
Beauman has an easy, able style that is largely unobtrusive during Colonel Julyan's, Terence Gray's, and Ellie Julyan's narrative sections. The bulk of evidence to be got through is too large--some might say unwieldy--to allow for any authorial flourishes, most of which Beauman saves for Rebecca's section. Beauman or her editor is a bit too enamored of parentheses as a stylistic quirk. And, rather exasperatingly, Beauman's narrators preface almost every event of import with statements such as "of course, I wasn't to know that yet," or "I would later find out how significant this was, but at first I had no idea; let's go back to when I had no idea."
In all, RT is an engrossing mystery, and will certainly keep you awake nights (or night) trying to string together the trails of evidence presented. But I think you may find yourself, as I have, nursing an uneasy conviction that we have still not gotten the whole story. Perhaps this is what Beauman wishes--for the ambivalence surrounding Rebecca's life and death to continue, even after all the evidence has been weighed and all the testifiers have had their say.
Note: The Harper-Collins trade edition includes a critical essay by author Sally Beauman.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
terrible, December 20, 2007
Rebecca was a wonderfully, haunting gothic tale. Rebecca's tale is not. It's not even a decent detective story. Rebecca is a vivid character, a character that colours the lives of everyone in the original work, you are left to wonder at her. She is accomplished, beautiful and everyone desires her, yet.. It is made clear in the original story that she is manipulative, a liar and she had numerous affairs (confirmed by Flavell and Danvers).
However, Miss Beauman decides that clearly Rebecca is a modern heroine who must be praised for cuckolding her husband. After all she was being emotionally oppressed by the man apparently so everything her character does is justified. It is a very modern approach to the character and pushed so throroughly that we have to hate the timid original narrator. Indeed when Mrs De Winter appears, she does not seem to have aged, in fact, she seems as dreamy and timid as from the first book.
Rebecca's Tale does not give us a true picture of Rebecca, it gives us a rosy, sympathetic view. She is portrayed as this ultimate feminist, obviously wonderful because she doesn't settle into a 'wifely' role and perfectly entitled to cheat on her husband, because he doesn't stoke her fire enough. Rebecca in the original is ambivalent, she's a strong woman, yet deceitful; accomplished yet her likeability is a façade, she is a bright star that burns. Her truth can be seen through many of the characters in Rebecca, not just Max. Mrs Danvers confirms that she hates the men in her life and that she slept around, that Maxim was tricked into marriage. Yes Rebecca is a vivid character, yet this obsession to turn her into a modern heroine who is railing against traditional constraints is terrible and doesn't work.
Maxim is also terribly dealt with, once again, the depths of the character are ignored and Miss Beauman focuses on the 'evilness' of being a man unwilling to endure scandal. Maxim always struck me as a troubled character, one driven to the ultimate act of revenge, struck by guilt and his attention to duty. Yet Max De Winter is ignobly killed off.
I found Rebecca's tale unsatisfying as it seemed determined to push modern attitudes on the main characters and ignoring the many facets of the original cast. There was a determination to push Rebecca as a victim of terrible men and really, there was more to the character than that.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Let her rest in peace, September 5, 2007
Several attempts to revive the mystery around "Rebecca" and free-ride on her posthumous fame have failed, see "Mrs. de Winter" by Susan Hill or "The Other Rebecca" by the otherwise eclectic author/translator Maureen Freely. I, too, accounted for the numerous non-buyers of these works, mainly to spare myself the disappointment of an artificial lighting of an intentionally dim novel, one of my youth's favorites. But Beauman's résumé and her selection by the Du Maurier estate sounded promising. Her book was not to be a mere infusion or even a sequel to the old Rebecca, but a differentiated look at her life story. She made good on that promise, though to a bigger extent than I bargained for.
The book is divided into four parts, each of which represents memories of Rebecca and dealings with her death 20 years earlier by differently affected individuals, taking the reader on a scavenger hunt that is only moderately exciting. As a surprise, Rebecca gets the chance to voice herself in the third part, based on a previously found journal written in the form of a letter to a figure which I won't reveal for spoiler reasons. There she dishes about her adolescence and her irrepressible ascent to A-list socialite. Silly as it all is, this chapter occupies the first place on the quality scale of Beauman's writing chops, as demonstrated in this book. Over-the-top emotions aside, the language is fresh without being too flowery and offers a rare, relatively engrossing glimpse into the state of mind and heart of the legendary beauty. That's right, she had feelings, too, but those got hurt early on, so that she spent the rest of her brief life brewing a complicated mix of revenge and true love, independence and married wealth (Scarlett O'Hara sends her best).
The other three chapters describe the obsessive research, or rather long obituaries, by two minor and one non-existent character from the original book. This was as boring as it sounds, since Beauman, instead of at least crafting a good (as in less verbose) crime story out of it, spins what little those folks had to say into endless loops and reflections, which presumably should have familiarized the reader with the English countryside nobility, but just felt like work. It was cumbersome to filter out the few clues relevant to the story because, like some more needlessly added characters, they could not leave absolutely anything unsaid. What was left to the reader's imagination in the original had created a phantom figure; dismantling it now, and in such a predictable fashion, only created a cardboard. Rebecca was not only unbelievably beautiful and desired by everyone between six and 106, now we learn what she looked like. With that admitted curiosity quenched, one could have let her be, but oh no, she was also naturally fluent in French, wore Chanel, was a connoisseur of wine and fine cuisine, while of course slim as a deer, and remains as enigmatic as a tabloid fixture. And I'm not even getting into the degrees of kinship and sexual orientations Beauman imposes; let's just say that they would give both a genealogist and a TV soap producer migraines.
In sharp contrast to the gabbiness of minor characters, the famously nameless heroine of the original story was dismissed within a few pages as a plain Jane whom no one remembers anyway. Betraying the style and class of the original so early on, this pathetic portrayal should have alerted me to invest my time elsewhere, but principle alone kept me from quitting. An intriguing path to a reunion with crazy ol' Mrs. Danvers, Rebecca's mean governess with a crush on her, ends in anticlimax as well. At the end of a long book one is none the smarter, as far as Rebecca is concerned, except for one confirmed truth: making a new fable out of old ones is an easy temptation which, like so many others, should be resisted.
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