Rebecca

Chapters 1-6

Reading Check

1.The narrator is dreaming of Manderley, and because she is in a dream, the nettles do not hurt her. (Chapter 1)

2. Maxim de Winter is the man who owns Manderley. Mrs. Van Hopper says he cannot get over his wife’s death. (Chapter 2)

3. Monte Carlo (Chapters 3-4)

4. Mr. de Winter grows cold and unresponsive, and the narrator notices a faint line between his brows. (Chapter 3)

5. Maxim asks the narrator to marry him. (Chapter 6)

Short Answer

1. Manderley’s appearance in the narrator’s dream implies that the narrator has intense, vivid memories of Manderley. She speaks of Manderley as if it is a living being, revealing that her time there must have been spectacular in some way. (Chapter 1)

2. Mr. de Winter cleans up the spilled water and flowers and invites the narrator to dine with him. This is significant because, despite being from a higher social class, Mr. de Winter acts as a servant for the narrator, reversing their typical roles in society. (Chapter 4)

3. The servants immediately treat the narrator as if she belongs to a higher class after seeing her eat with Mr. de Winter. They pull out her chair and pick up her handkerchief. This contrasts sharply with her treatment when she dined with Mrs. Van Hopper, when she was served leftover beef and tongue. (Chapter 4)

4. Mr. de Winter creates a more personal bond between the two by asking the narrator to call him by his first name. The narrator is thrilled by this at first, but then she remembers that Rebecca addressed the book of poems to “Max,” a name even more personal and intimate than Maxim. This rekindles the narrator’s feelings of jealousy. (Chapter 5)

5. The narrator burns the first page with the dedication from Rebecca. The narrator still feels intense jealousy toward Rebecca, even though she is now engaged to Maxim. (Chapter 6)

6. Mrs. Van Hopper tells the narrator that she believes she is making a mistake. She thinks that the narrator will not be able to entertain or throw parties like Rebecca was able to, and that the narrator will not be able to take care of Manderley. This echoes the narrator’s own insecurities and amplifies them. (Chapter 6)

Chapters 7-13

Reading Check

1. The narrator describes Mrs. Danvers as skeleton-like, gaunt, and lifeless. (Chapter 7)

2. The narrator’s room is in the east wing, the area of the house previously used for visitors. (Chapter 7)

3. Red rhododendrons (Chapter 8)

4. The narrator follows Jasper when he runs away. (Chapter 10)

5. London (Chapter 13)

6. The visitor is a man called Mr. Favell. He asks the narrator not to tell Maxim that he has been at Manderley. (Chapter 13)

Short Answer

1. The rhododendrons are taller than the narrator or Maxim, and their color is a prominent, extremely bright red. The extravagance of the red rhododendrons exacerbates the narrator’s fears about the house and emphasizes its intimidating appearance. They might foreshadow Rebecca’s fierce, confident, prominent presence in the house. (Chapter 7)

2.  The narrator feels as if she is a visitor in someone else’s home. She is surrounded by Rebecca’s letters and handwriting, and she feels completely out of place. When Mrs. Danvers calls her asking for Mrs. de Winter, the narrator says that Mrs. de Winter is dead, revealing that she thinks of Rebecca, not herself, as the true Mrs. de Winter. (Chapter 8)

3. Beatrice says she expected the narrator to be more of a social butterfly. Later, she says that the narrator is nothing like Rebecca. (Chapter 9)

4. The narrator learns that Rebecca furnished the boathouse entirely and had guests visit there, occasionally entertaining people for moonlight picnics. Frank is reserved and uncomfortable during the conversation, as if he is hiding something from the narrator. (Chapter 11)

5. As soon as Rebecca breaks the cupid, she turns to the door in fear. She is afraid that Mrs. Danvers or another servant of the house will see that she has broken one of Rebecca’s belongings. She hides the broken cupid in shame, suggesting that she still does not feel at home at Manderley. (Chapter 12)

6. The narrator tells Maxim that she and Clarice are similar. She feels as if she is a maid, like Clarice, not the mistress of the house. (Chapter 13)

Chapters 14-20

Reading Check

1. Mrs. Danvers tells the narrator to jump out a window. She says that the narrator does not belong, and that she will never take Rebecca’s place. As if in a trance, the narrator stares out the window and down at the stone terrace below, but she stops short of jumping when she suddenly hears signal rockets exploding from a ship on the water. (Chapter 18)

2. The boat that belonged to Rebecca, with a body in the boat (Chapter 19)

Short Answer

1. Mrs. Danvers keeps the room fresh and fully furnished, as if Rebecca still lives there. This reveals that Mrs. Danvers has tried to keep Rebecca’s presence alive in the house. (Chapter 14)

2. The narrator agrees to host a ball at Manderley to prove her place as mistress of the house and to prove that she does belong to the higher class. Frank and Maxim suggest that she wear an Alice in Wonderland costume, which is significant because the narrator is very much like Alice, but lost at Manderley instead of in Wonderland. (Chapter 15)

3. Mrs. Danvers convinces the narrator to wear a costume based on a portrait of a woman in white. When the narrator wears this costume to the ball, the guests are horrified, and Maxim asks the narrator to change. The narrator soon discovers that the dress is the same costume Rebecca wore to their last ball. Mrs. Danvers has deliberately sabotaged the narrator, who was so desperate to fit in at Manderley that she believed whatever Mrs. Danvers had to say. (Chapters 16-17)

4. Mrs. Danvers tells the narrator that Rebecca was more like a boy than a girl. Given the gender roles of the time, this means that Rebecca was confident, able to control a household, independent-minded, and not reliant on Maxim. This emphasizes the difference between the narrator and Rebecca, as the narrator’s shyness and modesty are more traditionally feminine than Rebecca’s powerful personality. Rebecca seems to have freed herself from societal constraints on women’s behavior. (Chapter 18)

5. Maxim learned, after marrying Rebecca, that she was incapable of loving him. However, he felt that he could not divorce her because it would not be proper. Rebecca agreed to live with him if she could run Manderley. As the years passed, she began to flirt with Frank and Giles, and she had an affair with Jack Favell. When Maxim confronted her, she said that because he would never divorce her, he must put up with her infidelity. Maxim then shot her. (Chapter 20)

Chapters 21-27

Reading Check

1. The narrator’s love for Maxim grows after she learns that he doesn’t really love Rebecca. (Chapters 19-21)

2. The coroner concludes that Rebecca’s death was a suicide. (Chapter 23)

3. Dr. Baker (Chapter 25)

4. Colonel Julyan advises Maxim to get out of England and go to Switzerland. (Chapter 27)

Short Answer

1. This question can be answered in different ways. Maxim may be seen as a villain for murdering his wife and covering up the murder. Alternatively, Maxim may be considered a victim of aristocratic marital conventions. (Chapters 19-23)

2. The narrator imagines murdering him and hiding the body, as Maxim did to Rebecca. This is significant because it proves how the narrator’s identity has merged with Maxim’s so far as to take on his twisted moral compass. (Chapter 23)

3. Dr. Baker reveals that Rebecca suffered from a type of cancer that prevented her from becoming pregnant. Directly before her death, Rebecca provoked Maxim about having children, prompting their explosive argument and Maxim’s decision to kill her. This diagnosis raises the question of whether Rebecca was depressed about the diagnosis and manipulated Maxim into killing her. (Chapter 26)

4. Maxim believes that Rebecca wanted him to kill her, and this justifies the murder. Although Maxim may be correct, this does not excuse murder, and the fact that Maxim shows no remorse is even more troubling. (Chapter 27)

5. Manderley was a symbol of memory, of jealousy, and of Rebecca herself. The destruction of Manderley can have multiple interpretations. The destruction may symbolize the end of Rebecca’s hold on the narrator and Maxim, and a new start for the couple. The ending may also symbolize the continuing dominance of the patriarchal aristocratic class. Rebecca attempted to subvert the expectations of a wife, and her death and the destruction of Manderley reveal the impossibility of true independence as a woman in the strict, class-conscious, gendered society of 1930s England. (Chapter 27)