The Scapegoat (Virago Modern Classics)

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On another occasion, when the reader is finally about to learn the truth about the mysterious Maurice Duval,

The Scapegoat is a tightly plotted novel, full of suspense, coincidence, and secrets. Like My Cousin Rachel,I think that’s as much as I can say without spoilers. This is another book that grabs me so much it’s hard for me to put down.

While contemporary writers were dealing critically with such subjects as the war, alienation, religion, poverty, Marxism, psychology and art, and experimenting with new techniques such as the stream of consciousness, du Maurier produced 'old-fashioned' novels with straightforward narratives that appealed to a popular audience's love of fantasy, adventure, sexuality and mystery. At an early age, she recognised that her readership was comprised principally of women, and she cultivated their loyal following through several decades by embodying their desires and dreams in her novels and short stories. You will need to seriously suspend disbelief for this story as it’s highly implausible and yet it had me intrigued from start to finish. I think that is credit to the author’s unique writing ability. I adored the descriptive element of the novel, the characters are flawed and dislikable ( apart from one or two) which was an element I really enjoyed. The story is suspenseful and atmosphere and reading this over the Halloween period cosied up by the fire was my perfect transition into wintertime here in Ireland. John is left to himself in a strange château, with a strange new identity and even stranger new family. wishing to condemn him, it was as if it was the shadow I condemned, the man who had moved and spoken and acted in his place, and not Jean de Gué at all.so do you, and Renée, and the woman in Villars". I didn't answer her"' (p.283). Jean's mother concludes by saying 'You've got what you wanted, haven't you?' There he meets his doppelgänger's family: Jean's feeble, pregnant wife Françoise and over-imaginative young daughter Marie-Noel; his dull brother Paul and embittered sister Blanche; Paul's frustrated wife (and Jean's mistress) Renée; and Jean's elderly, morphine-addicted mother. As he learns about the decades of resentments and failures that haunt the family, John feels he should do something to help put things right. is more reminiscent of Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde in which the two selves are part of the same person. In The Scapegoat, One of the triggers was that while out for a walk in a square in a French town, Daphne du Maurier saw a man who looked identical to someone she happened to know. According to one of her biographers, Judith Cook, she then watched a family scene through a window, and began to put the two incidents together in her feverish imagination. Typically, she began to wonder about the people; who they were, and what their secrets might be,

When John wakes up – Jean has taken all of John’s possessions and gone. He is left with Jean’s clothes, luggage, identity documents – and none of his own. Left with little option, he decides to go to Jean’s house. I have read several of Daphne Du Maurier's books and loved every single one. Rebecca is my favorite but this book came very close to it.If you swallow the far-fetched concept of doppelgängers so identical that nobody at all can tell them apart, then this is a premise rife with possibility. And, look, it isn’t possible. I speak as someone with a literal clone, and very few people would think we were the same person. No matter – let’s go on with the show. And if you could step into one of these men's lives - by trading places --as a stranger/ actor taking over the role.... how do you think you might make a difference? And how might you do harm? In THIS story...we get the opportunity to watch how the entire scenario - this crazy game - so to speak - affects each person. There are significant differences between this adaptation and the original novel. While the action of the novel takes place in France, the screen version is set in England. All of the main characters are British. The novel's narrator (known only as John in the book) is named John Standing in the film, his wife (Françoise) is re-named Frances and his doppelgänger (Jean de Gué) is called Johnny Spence. Some of the other characters' names have also been changed. mother off morphine, 'tonight she'll be a raving maniac', and he thinks that John's plan for Renée and Paul will break up their marriage even sooner, 'Renée

whether he will inherit the money if she dies. '"What happens if I die? You get everything, don't you?" "You're not going to die"' Indeed there are at least two other contenders for the description of "scapegoat". Either the daughter or the wife could be seen in these terms. Marie-Noel seems over-eager to sacrifice herself for her father, as does Françoise, the Count's wife. The intensity of the little girl Marie-Noel's relationship with her father is clearly a reflection of that between the author, Daphne du Maurier, and her own father, the charismatic actor-manager Gerald du Maurier. The book, after a brief slow start through John/Jean's initial meeting, is both spellbinding and transfixing. We share the narrator's experience and trepidation of walking in another man's shoes - literally - and are willing him to not put a foot wrong, which he does regardless, and, to his incredulity, his part of the deception remains undiscovered by any family member, of the human variety at least.

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Also, what I felt about the story was quite augmented by its characters. I've come across many dislikable characters in Daphne du Maurier's books, but I've not met a bunch like in here, not quite. It's not so much dislike that I felt, but a sense that they are somehow unrealistic - the whole of them, including the protagonist. This sense of unreality worked negatively at forming any connection with them. I made an effort to feel some sympathy towards them, just to anchor myself to the story, and succeeded for a time, to direct them towards Francoise (Jean's wife) and Blanche (his sister) who were both utterly wronged by the true Jean de Gue. But in truth, I couldn't connect with any of them enough to be drawn into the story.