Filtering the Truth Through Gothic Lenses: The Undermining of Relationships and Realities in Daphne du Maurier’s Short Stories
This essay uses a literary Gothic lens to explore predatory and deceptive, dangerous relationships in Daphne du Maurier’s short stories. As Nina Auerbach comments of du Maurier’s work, “I have found in no other writer’s work the same tough-minded anatomy of family life combined with so eerie a patin...
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| Udgivet i: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/jsse, |
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| Hovedforfatter: | |
| Format: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Sprog: | Anglais |
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Journal of the Short Story in English
2023
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| Online adgang: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Summary: | This essay uses a literary Gothic lens to explore predatory and deceptive, dangerous relationships in Daphne du Maurier’s short stories. As Nina Auerbach comments of du Maurier’s work, “I have found in no other writer’s work the same tough-minded anatomy of family life combined with so eerie a patina of domestic strangeness” (13). As a Gothic woman writer, du Maurier offers no cosy domestic scenarios or safe families. In her work, self-delusion dominates, families are undone by selfishness, and romance dissolves into dangerous dullness. For the selfish male partners, dull husbands with murderous intent, and the equally selfish daughters and lovers, there is no generous sense of any other humans. No one is worthy of any behaviour modification or duty of care. Like Angela Carter after her, and other contemporary women writers of the Gothic, du Maurier undermines myths and the narrative trajectories which sustain certain certainties of both everyday life and dreams, thereby destroying a form of ontological security. Initially this essay studies several stories which deal with dead-end and/or dangerous romantic relationships, and predatory domestic relationships. It then focuses in particular on “The Blue Lenses” and “The Alibi,” two stories where dangerous, self-deceptive storytelling meets predatory relationships. |
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