Rebecca

Hello.

On tonight's review show, The Housekeeper, Rose Tremaine's imagined prequel to Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, the prize-winning film Queen at Sea, starring Juliette Binoche and Tom Courtenay, and Thelma and Louise, the stage musical.

Our reviewers tonight are critics Robbie Collin and Sarah Crompton.

And we start with a Welsh actor making Emmy history.

And For the Beast in Me is on Netflix, all starring Matthew Rhys.

Well, let's turn now to our first proper review.

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again, one of the most famous opening lines of 20th century British literature, from Rebecca, of course, by Daphne du Maurier.

Originally published in 1938, it's a gothic thriller about a young bride entering the home haunted by the absence of the eponymous First Mrs De Winter.

Her death was announced today.

On tomorrow's show, Samira and her guests will be reviewing Rose Tremaine's new book, The Housekeeper, which imagines how Daphne du Maurier's classic novel, Rebecca, came to be written.

They'll be talking about the film Queen at Sea, starring Juliette Binoche, who spoke to Samira on front row, and the new Thelma and Louise musical at the Young Vic.

So do join Samira tomorrow at 7.15.

So I'm just going to go ahead and answer this for all of you, because we've talked about it so many times over the past six years that I think I know the answer for each of you.

Mary Kay, it's Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.

Patty, it's The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis.

Christy, it's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith.

And then as I got older, I really got kind of pulled into the classics.

I remember reading Rebecca in eighth grade and just being blown away.

I Capture the Castle is something, a book I come back to all the time.

And Jane Austen has really been a touch point for me in the way that she has written books honestly as much romance, but more of the relationship between women and domestic dramas.

But I'm a human like you, and I have thoughts like these, and I felt that maybe I should share that sometimes I also have thoughts like these.

So we were in our Maison Gatan call for the end of the month last month, and one of my dear members... asked about it and a few people chimed in that no they were in fact interested and they were in fact reading them which is so funny because if I look at the actual numbers on those Substack posts that came out about my personal curriculum like a few thousand people read them right so clearly somebody somewhere was reading it but this is what we do right we're human we get in our own heads We think no one's watching.

No one's reading.

This isn't important to anybody.

I'm just not going to do it.

I mean, just the writing craft here is so good.

If you have not read Rebecca, please, please go do so.

And I would recommend close reading it, taking your time to slow down and read it to actually, you know, handwrite passages that move you to take notes on connections and things that you're seeing.

We go to 1938.

Daphne du Maurier as Rebecca.

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.

Arguably one of the greatest opening lines in English literature.

but there is a crushing problem.

The first Mrs.

De Winter-Rebecca is dead, but she is essentially still running the house.

Her presence is utterly suffocating.

In these books, the house isn't just a setting where the plot happens.

The house is an active character with an agenda, and we start with a book where the house is arguably much more famous than the protagonist, Daphne du Maurier's 1938 Gothic classic, Rebecca.

"Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again," another opening line deeply embedded in our literary DNA.

These first 10 pages operate as a haunted house tour conducted by a woman who, crucially, still will not give the reader her first name.

She is shy to the point of complete self-erasure.

She constantly folds herself into corners, hoping not to be noticed, and that shyness is the engine of the entire psychological thriller.

Rebecca is fundamentally a book about the social physics of who is allowed to take up space in the world.

I always think of this book as a bait and switch.

The lovers can hear each other over time and space.

By the way, another famous novel that very closely follows, excuse me, another famous novel that very closely models Jane Eyre and is clearly based on it, is Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.

In fact, it's so close, I don't know how she got away with it, but apparently taking the plots and characters of old novels and refurbishing them is perfectly acceptable.

Barbara Kingsolver did it in David Copperhead, i.e. David Copperfield.

Think about Woody Allen and Roman Polanski.

People still go to their movies, even though they're pedophiles.

Anyway, if you haven't read Rebecca, you should, and not go by the movies any more than you would Jane Eyre.

The similarities between them are that a poorish young woman falls in love with a rich older man who takes her to his estate in an isolated place.

third choice.

I've gone for Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier.

I

thought you might pick that.

I know, it is

predictable, but for a reason.

But also, I think the reason Rebecca is special is because, as I mentioned earlier on the podcast, I hate old books.

I really don't enjoy...