I Can't Stop Thinking About...Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier

I was not even 40 pages into reading “Rebecca” by Daphne Du Maurier when I looked up and said “Holy crap, this is brilliant.”

This feels like stating the obvious as evident by the fact that “Rebecca” was published in 1938 and hasn’t been out of print since then. It counts topless “Best Of” lists and won an award for being the novel of the century. Taylor Swift even wrote a song about it.

“Rebecca” is a masterclass in setting and place. Every description of Manderly, every turn of phrase moved me. Even the decision to make the narrator unnamed struck me: How brilliant to make only the name of her larger-than-life predecessor known, how utterly telling. But I’d also argue “Rebecca” is up there with “Sex and the City” with how it speaks to romance, even 85+ years after its publication.

“Rebecca” is about a young woman in her early twenties, naive and resigned to her life working as a companion to an overbearing socialite. While in Monte Carlo, the narrator meets a handsome and aloof older man: Maxim De Winter.

After a whirlwind courtship, the narrator agrees to marry Maxim and gives up her job to move to his seaside estate, Manderly. Upon arriving, our narrator senses much left unresolved from her new husband’s previous wife, Rebecca, whose presence is still very much felt at the Cornish home.

Maxim becomes withdrawn whenever Rebecca is brought up. He shows no interest in spending time with the narrator. He frequently refers to her as a child. There’s a distance between them, no matter how she tries to connect. She calls it “first love,” but it’s achingly obvious to the narrator that part of him is still hung up on Rebecca.

The more obvious this seems, the more obsessed with her the narrator becomes, endlessly comparing herself to the specter of her husband’s late wife. She attempts to love him and he, as put by Taylor Swift, tolerates it. The feelings reading this felt like deja vu.

When I was around the same age as the narrator, I met an older guy. Much like De Winter, he was recently single, though his ex was not dead. (She left him after seven years together.)

The years he had on me, and the relationship experience he had intimidated me. His ex intimidated me more. Much like Maxim, he didn’t bring her up much; I only found out he’d dated someone long-term shortly before me when he added me on Facebook and I saw photos of them together. This increased my intrigue.

So his ex’s public social media became my porthole into their relationship, the grid painting a fuller picture. The two of them went on vacations together. They traipsed around New York City in matching Halloween costumes and coordinating outfits. She once posted a photo of a necklace he got her before taking her to see “Cinderella” on Broadway.

“Thanks for making me feel like a princess,” she wrote.

We didn’t go to Broadway shows. We didn’t go on trips. He certainly didn’t make me feel like a princess. Instead, I’d try to plan dates only to have them not work out due to work schedules. We’d end up watching movies together in silence, sitting on opposite ends of the couch. Much like our narrator in “Rebecca,” I couldn’t help but feel frustrated when my efforts to connect with him went unnoticed and wonder what was different about his ex that made him more engaged with her.

I won’t say how “Rebecca” ends, but my relationship took a dovetail from the narrator’s. After months of trying to feel like I was enough for my ex, we broke up. I threw myself back out there before I could sulk too much and in doing so, accidentally met my now-partner who makes me feel loved and validated every single day. (He is probably reading this newsletter now. Hi Matt!) I buried the feelings from my previous relationship until I started “Rebecca.”

When the narrator tells her employer, Mrs. Van. Hopper, she’s leaving to marry Maxim, Mrs. Van Hopper tells her he’s marrying the narrator because he’s lonely. This struck me. There were other reasons things didn’t work out with my ex, but I often think I never would’ve dated him now because it’s clear in hindsight he wasn’t really “present” in our relationship. I suspected he was with me because I was there and he didn’t know how to be alone.

Here is where “Rebecca” remains relevant, even 85+ years after publishing. It’s a story not just about what we do for love, but how it feels to love someone who is with you because they can’t be alone and you’re convenient. I’ve seen this play out in my friends’ love lives. Before my ex, I met many men who I felt were just looking for someone to be by their side. There’s so much emphasis on being in a relationship that people feel compelled to partner up for the sake of it. But ending up with someone in that situation feels just as lonely and “Rebecca” bares witness to this (at least in the first half, IYKYK).

“Rebecca” unlocked in me a grief and anger I didn’t know I had. I look back now and realize my love and affection were wasted on someone who simply wasn’t in the place to return it. Allowing myself to acknowledge this—along with getting swept away by the beautiful writing—is why “Rebecca” ended up being such a gift. I haven’t shut up about it to my friends and I will not for a long, long time.

I also can’t stop thinking about…

• “Reign” - I’ve mentioned it before but I resumed streaming this CW show about Mary, Queen of Scots is so historically inaccurate, but it is truly just vibes with its Forever 21 dresses and constant murder plots.

• This article in the “Boston Globe” about the fear of Alzheimer’s you develop after losing someone to this nasty disease.

• “Fat Ham” which is a retelling of Hamlet. I saw it in Boston two weeks ago and got to interview the director of the original Broadway production. It was so funny while also leaving a poignant message about breaking cycles of trauma and violence.