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My Cousin Rachel

Daphne du Maurier

Start date: March 1, 2018

Finish date: March 31, 2018

Discussion: Current Group Read

Discussion leader: Emily

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Dec 23, 2024 Namida... rated it it was amazing

I am not really in my best state to write anything now but I know if I wait till morning I won't be able to capture this feeling.

After the first turn of events, I found myself saying "hmm I wish Rachel was written to be more morally ambiguous, as it is now, she is quite cartoonishly evil" AND THEN THE FINAL CLIMAX LEFT ME SCREAMING.

Multiple things, I don't think I will ever make up my mind about whether or not she was innocent. Perhaps merely, she didn't poison anyone but she was indeed after t I am not really in my best state to write anything now but I know if I wait till morning I won't be able to capture this feeling.

After the first turn of events, I found myself saying "hmm I wish Rachel was written to be more morally ambiguous, as it is now, she is quite cartoonishly evil" AND THEN THE FINAL CLIMAX LEFT ME SCREAMING.

Multiple things, I don't think I will ever make up my mind about whether or not she was innocent. Perhaps merely, she didn't poison anyone but she was indeed after the fortune, perhaps not so much a kleptomaniac but just with an instinct of self preservation born out of the circumstances of her life. And she had far too many encounters with terrible men to trust them. Perhaps not so much a calculating manipulator but indeed an impulsive, emotionally driven woman, the death of her son, and the chance of her having children, her fear of ending up like her mother, all leading to that instinct of self-preservation again. But not a scheming villain by any means.

I have many reasons to think so. Among which, that others mentioned also, the dogs loved her, instinctively, and they are no gullible infatuated Philip who is way more unfeeling and selfish, towards animals and otherwise.

Philip IS an unreliable narrator, that is very evident. And in fact, during the climax I found myself wondering what purpose Louise served by being there at all, but if you think about it, with her there, it was as if we had another perspective than Philip's. If Philip had indeed been delirious bec of his fever and his unreliable status, we cannot trust him alone. After all, with Louise, he never found those poisonous seeds in the drawer under lock and key, the poison that made him sure of Rachel's guilt, there were no seeds with Louise there, and the Rainaldi from the letter he read in Louise's presence, is quite different from the Rainaldi we got from his point of view, the Rainaldi from the letter seemed to confirm, if anything, that Rachel did care for Philip and not him.

But specifically upon that last point, and because we have Philip as narrator, I find Rachel's feelings towards him very confusing. Did she actually care? She was very adamant about not wanting to marry him, but she accepted his advances TWICE. And the second even after he tried to choke her, and again because we have Philip as the narrator, we don't see that she does the second out of fear for example, she seemed very happy the next day and invited people over and her last encounter with him seemed to be her taking the walk 'happily' even.

Someone else pointed out that she really had no real motivation to kill neither Philip nor Ambrose, why would she kill Ambrose knowing he left her nothing in his will, and why kill Philip when he gave her all his property, if she was scheming, she could've continued coaxing Ambrose a bit more, and she was leaving Philip anyway, she needed him to manage the estate. Not to mention, as someone pointed out also, that the kind of poisonous seeds they talked about were specifically said to kill quickly, not the slow death they experienced, and if Philip was truly believed to be on his death bed when he had meningitis, why would she nurse him back to health, at first I thought maybe she'd do that so that people in the county thought well of her but no, literally everyone thought Philip was going to die, and if it wasn't for her, he would have died bec of his meningitis and no one would've suspected anything and she'd have had her wish, if her wish WAS to kill him. No, I have quite made up my mind that she wasn't poisoning him, nor Ambrose, especially with the last note from Ambrose hinting he had some sense towards the end, however, I can see her having led Philip on and indulged his childish fancies to her end, which was the money, perhaps wanting to feel young herself but with enough dignity in herself not to marry him. That's what I choose to believe in the end.

(Also the person who noted that all the male characters probably suffered from lead poisoning made me laugh so hard!!) ...more

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Sep 17, 2019 Natalie rated it really liked it

Amazing!! What an ending. I’m currently watching the movie 🎥🍿
Review soon

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Jun 04, 2017 Ciera rated it really liked it

Shelves: literature-and-non-fiction, list

What a great ending! Did she do it? Was she innocent? Each individual reader must decide for themselves. I think I enjoyed My Cousin Rachel even more than Rebecca.

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