English language - extract from Rebecca by Daphne duMaurier

The extract is from Chapter 16 of Rebecca, and starts with the paragraph, ‘As we crossed the great hall on the way to our rooms’ ending with, ‘The dress fitted perfectly. I stood still, hardly able to restrain my impatience while Clarice hooked me up with fumbling fingers.’ The novel can be borrowed from your school or local library.

I wrote the questions & also the answers for this one.

Question 2: How has the writer used language to describe the house in lines 9-21?

The narrator describes a house transformed by the party preparations – one that has a long history of holding celebrations.

The narrator says that the house ‘has come alive’, using personification to show the transformation from ‘austerity’ to its new ‘reckless, pleasing air’. The personification is further developed, when the narrator says that ‘it was as if the house remembered other days’ and she goes on to imagine past celebrations from different eras. She goes even further, describing the house as having human qualities, when she says that it had ‘a certain grace and dignity’ suggesting that as the house aged, it matured, like a person would.

The reader gets the impression of an ancient house, with a long and rich history. The details that this description includes: ‘a banqueting hall’, ‘tapestries’ and a ‘wide stone staircase’ all suggest grandeur and wealth. The narrator seems to feel slightly uneasy to be holding her modern party in this setting. She feels that modern ‘jig-tunes’ will be out of place here and that somehow her choices don’t quite fit in this venerable old home.

Question 3: How has the writer structured the text to create a sense of anticipation?

The extract opens with detailed description of the party preparations. The writer focusses the reader’s attention on one sumptuous detail after another. The action at this point is all in the future, and the reader shares the narrator’s sense of anticipation for the party that is clearly to come.

In the second paragraph, the focus shifts into the thoughts of the first person narrator. There is still anticipation, but the reader is given a glimpse of previous celebrations in the great ‘banqueting hall’. The effect of this paragraph is to increase the reader’s desire to ‘attend’ the party, but also to delay the fulfilment of that desire. There is also the suggestion of foreshadowing in this paragraph, as the narrator, who has clearly made many of the party plans, seems uneasy about her choices, and seems to regret them, thinking, ‘they would not suit Manderley’.

In the final paragraph, the reader’s attention is shifted back to the action of the party preparations, but this time we are in the intimate setting of the narrator’s bedroom as she is getting dressed. There is much excitement between Mrs de Winter and Clarice. However, the suggestion of uneasy foreshadowing established in the previous paragraph is developed as the women are ’conspirators’ and ‘allies’ and have ‘barred’ the door against Maxim, suggesting that they are doing something that they think is wrong.

Question 4: DuMaurier has filled this part of the novel with excited anticipation. To what extent do you agree?

The extract is filled with excited anticipation from beginning to end, with just a slight suggestion of unease towards the end.

The opening paragraph is rich with description of the details of the party decorations. The paragraph is full of adjectives, like ‘beautiful’, ‘red’, and ‘silver’ all of which have connotations of wealth and passion. The narrator contrasts the ‘blaze of colour now’ with how she normally finds the rooms: ‘formal and cold’. These sound like two different houses to the reader. Details like the ‘minstrels’ gallery’ and ‘fairy lights’ suggest a very romantic setting and that the ball that will follow with be a splendid affair.

The narrator’s detour into her own thoughts and imaginings of previous parties at the house only deepen the reader’s sense of anticipation for what is to come. The house has ‘come alive’ and has a ‘significant’ and ‘triumphant’ air. All of these ideas suggest that the narrator suddenly feels her own insignificance in the face of this house with its long history of the many generations who have passed through it before her. She seems to be uneasy about the choices she has made for the party, worrying that the ‘jig-tunes’ that the band will play might ‘degrade’ the house. ‘Degrade’ has powerful connotations of devaluing and demeaning and this sense is developed when the narrator seems to regret that there will be a ‘hotchpotch of humanity’ present that night. It’s not a kind way to think of her guests!

The reader cannot help but join with the narrator and Clarice’s excited ‘giggles’ as they get Mrs de Winter ready for the party. There are many suggestions that these two are, in fact, still very young, as they ‘giggled like schoolgirls’ and the narrator claims she feels ‘like a child again on the eve of Christmas’. Not only are these two excited, they seem to be excited in a secretive way: the tissue paper is ‘mysterious’, they are ‘conspirators’, their laughter is ‘furtive’ and their exclamations, ’stifled’. The reader cannot help but wonder what secret they are keeping, and from whom. Clarice’s nerves are evident, as her fingers ‘fumble’ in hooking up the dress.

Overall, this extract is filled with excitement, which the reader shares. However, the narrator’s unease about the choices she has made for the party, and the women’s secretive preparations, perhaps foreshadow that something is not quite right at Manderley and that the party may not go exactly to plan.