spiritual growth(book review of Rebecca)

Spiritual Growth——book review of RebeccaDaphne du Maurer is an English romantic woman writer. She hates city life and this kind of thought has influenced the style of her novels. Rebecca is her representative work. This novel portrays women’s psychological change and spiritual growth.The heroine of this novel is Maxim’s second wife; she is a simple and kind hearted lady who isn’t familiar with worldly affairs. Her parents died early and she lived a hard life in South France. Later, Maxim was engaged to her and they go to Mandalay. It seems to be the kick point of her fate, from now on; she can live a lovely life and need to worry about nothing. But her life in Mandalay isn’t as beautiful as we imagine. She has always lived a humbled life and she can’t adapt to everything in upper class. She hates meeting all kinds of people as a hostess and commanding people because it always makes her feel headache. What’s more, vase, raincoat, handkerchief, pet, park… It seems that everything in Mandalay can prove another woman’s exist, that woman is Rebecca, the former hostess of Mandalay! The young lady can’t overcome this maladjustment and even feel every people is hostile to her coming, every people is comparing her with Rebecca, especially Maxim and Ms. Danvers, and Maxim’s grandmother. They can’t forget Rebecca and Rebecca is a perfect women in their mind. She feels very sad because even though everyone calls her Ms. Wendell but her husband doesn’t love her at all.This is a necessary process of adapting to a new class. This kind of phenomenon exists in every society and every period. So Rebecca becomes an enduring star in literati. A class’ life is not only a kind of living style, but also cultural atmosphere that accumulated for so many years. Generally speaking, there are two normal ways to go into another class. One way is to inherit. That is to say, your ancestors live in this kind of life, you are influenced by what you constantly see and hear, so you can adapt to this class’life easily. The other way is to struggle. In this process, you improve yourself and change yourself, let yourself adapt to the culture both in appearance and temperament. In this way, you would succeed to go into another class, too. The heroine of this novel uses neither of the two ways to get into upper class. She uses quick marriage, get into Mandalay abruptly. We can image how absurd a woman who always does herself proud suddenly becomes a beggar is, in the same way, we can know discomfort a maid suddenly becomes a queen is. In Mandalay, she always behaves humble and prudently and even her servants look down upon her. What’s more, she thinks Maxim doesn’t love her and can’t forget Rebecca; her heart is locked by Mandalay.Later, Rebecca’s boat was found in an accident, all things about Rebecca gradually known to people. In the unavoidable circumstances, Maxim tells the poor young lady the truth. In fact, Maxim loves the young lady very much. In fact, Rebecca isn’t as perfect as the young lady has imagined at all. In most of the people’s eyes, Rebecca is a perfect woman. She is very beautiful and capable. In fact, she is dissolute and disloyal to her husband and considers her husband’s dignity as nothing. Finally,Maxim can’t stand Rebecca anymore and killed her. The young poor lady, Maxim’s second wife, finally hears the truth, hears her darling’s true feeling, she knows that she has misunderstood her husband. All about Rebecca is just her imagination. Now, the young lady comes to realize how ridiculous she was. She once thought as long as she submits to Maxim, wear clothes that Maxim likes, comb hair style that Maxim feels comfortable, struggle to adapt to Maxim’s everyday life, don’t refer to Rebecca or about boat or even about water, try to let Maxim forget previous days is love him, and then, Maxim would love her. But in fact, she doesn’t understand Maxim. She has imaged a perfect Rebecca, struggled with died person, torment herself hardly. In fact, her final enemy is herself. When she tells Maxim her true feeling honestly, she succeeds. The strength of communication is powerful. It is communication that put up the bridge between two souls that in love.Rebecca has a perfect ending, Ms. Danvers burnt Mandalay. The fire destroys everything that doesn’t need to exist between the two people. For Maxim, his spirit suffers from maintaining the reputation of Mandalay. His soul is constrained by the rules of upper class. For the young lady, she loves Maxim but she doesn’t love Mandalay. Now, she becomes a person who pays much attention to her heart and soul. She understands that she doesn’t need to change or fawn on others painstakingly. Just be herself is the best choice. She can try to understand and communicate others, and others will give her the same respect. Having experienced psychological change and spiritual growth, she can finally have a new attitude and begin her new life with her husband.。