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The Road To Manderley Lay Ahead. There Was No Moon. The Sky Above Our Heads Was Inky Black. But The Sky On The Horizon Was Not Dark At All. It Was Shot With Crimson, Like A Splash Of Blood. And The Ashes Blew Towards Us With The Salt Wind From The Sea.

-Daphne Du Maurier

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The Road To Manderley

Daphne Du Maurier

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The Road To Manderley Lay Ahead. There Was No Moon. The Sky Above Our Heads Was Inky Black. But The Sky On The Horizon Was Not Dark At All. It Was Shot With Crimson, Like A Splash Of Blood. And The Ashes Blew Towards Us With The Salt Wind From The Sea.

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...but I Should Say That Kindliness, And Sincerity, And If I May Say So--modesty--are Worth Far More To A Man, To A Husband, Than All The Wit And Beauty In The World.

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I Wondered Why It Was That Places Are So Much Lovelier When One Is Alone.

It Wouldn't Make For Sanity Would It, Living With The Devil.

The Urge To Climb Will Never Be Explained. In Olden Days, Perhaps It Was A Wish To Reach The Stars. Today, Anyone So Minded Can Buy A Seat On A Plane And Feel Himself Master Of The Skies. Even So, He Will Not Have Rock Under His Feet, Or Air Upon His Face; Nor Will He Know The Silence That Comes Only On The Hills.

We Know One Another. This Is The Present. There Is No Past And No Future. Here I Am Washing My Hands, And The Cracked Mirror Shows Me To Myself, Suspended As It Were, In Time; This Is Me, This Moment Will Not Pass.

...the Routine Of Life Goes On, Whatever Happens, We Do The Same Things, Go Through The Little Performance Of Eating, Sleeping, Washing. No Crisis Can Break Through The Crust Of Habit.

Sometimes It’s A Sort Of Indulgence To Think The Worst Of Ourselves. We Say, ‘now I Have Reached The Bottom Of The Pit, Now I Can Fall No Further,’ And It Is Almost A Pleasure To Wallow In The Darkness. The Trouble Is, It’s Not True. There Is No End To The Evil In Ourselves, Just As There Is No End To The Good. It’s A Matter Of Choice. We Struggle To Climb, Or We Struggle To Fall. The Thing Is To Discover Which Way We’re Going.

Look On Each Day That Comes As A Challenge, As A Test Of Courage. The Pain Will Come In Waves, Some Days Worse Than Others, For No Apparent Reason. Accept The Pain. Little By Little, You Will Find New Strength, New Vision, Born Of The Very Pain And Loneliness Which Seem, At First, Impossible To Master.

The Moment Of Crisis Had Come, And I Must Face It. My Old Fears, My Diffidence, My Shyness, My Hopeless Sense Of Inferiority, Must Be Conquered Now And Thrust Aside. If I Failed Now I Should Fail Forever.

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The Road To Manderley Lay Ahead. There Was No Moon. The Sky Above Our Heads Was Inky Black. But The Sky On The Horizon Was Not Dark At All. It Was Shot With Crimson, Like A Splash Of Blood. And The Ashes Blew Towards Us With The Salt Wind From The Sea.

Here Was A Silence Between Them For A Moment, And She Wondered If All Women, When In Love, Were Torn Between Two Impulses, A Longing To Throw Modesty And Reserve To The Winds And Confess Everything, And An Equal Determination To Conceal The Love Forever, To Be Cool, Aloof, Utterly Detached, To Die Rather Than Admit A Thing So Personal, So Intimate.

Watch That Boy. He's Going To Startle Somebody Someday.

I Had Build Up False Pictures In My Mind And Sat Before Them. I Had Never Had The Courage To Demand The Truth.

Looking From The Window At The Fantastic Light And Colour Of My Glittering Fairy-world Of Fact That Holds No Tenderness, No Quietude, I Long Suddenly For Peace, For Understanding.

I Thought Of All Those Heroines Of Fiction Who Looked Pretty When They Cried, And What A Contrast I Must Make With A Blotched And Swollen Face, And Red Rims To My Eyes.

All Autobiography Is Self-indulgent.

Happiness Happens When You Fit With Your Life, When You Fit So Harmoniously That Whatsoever You Are Doing Is Your Joy. Happiness Is Not A Possession To Be Prized, It Is A Quality Of Thought, A State Of Mind.

From The Very First, I Knew That It Would Be So...i Smiled To Myself, And Said, "that -- And None Other.

We Can See The Film Stars Of Yesterday In Yesterday’s Films, Hear The Voices Of Poest And Singers On A Record, Keep The Plays Of Dead Dramatists Upon Our Bookshelves, But The Actor Who Holds His Audience Captive For One Brief Moment Upon A Lighted Stage Vanishes Forever When The Curtain Falls.

But I Have Had Enough Melodrama In This Life, And Would Willingly Give My Five Senses If They Could Ensure Us Our Present Peace And Security. Happiness Is Not A Possession To Be Prized, It Is A Quality Of Thought, A State Of Mind. Of Course We Have Our Moments Of Depression; But There Are Other Moments Too, When Time, Unmeasured By The Clock, Runs On Into Eternity And, Catching His Smile, I Know We Are Together, We March In Unison, No Flash Of Thought Or Opinion Makes A Barrier Between Us.

Once A Person Gave His Talent To The World, The World Put A Stamp Upon It. The Talent Was Not A Personal Possession Any More. It Was Something To Be Traded, Bought And Sold. It Fetched A High Price, Or A Low One. It Was Kicked In The Common Market.

Either You Go To America With Mrs. Van Hopper Or You Come Home To Manderley With Me." "do You Mean You Want A Secretary Or Something?" "no, I'm Asking You To Marry Me, You Little Fool.

But Luxury Has Never Appealed To Me, I Like Simple Things, Books, Being Alone, Or With Somebody Who Understands.

Why, He Wondered, Should He Remember Her Suddenly, On Such A Day, Watching The Rain Falling On The Apple Trees?

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... And Through It All And Afterwards They Would Be Together, Making Their Own World Where Nothing Mattered But The Things They Could Give To One Another, The Loveliness, The Silence, And The Peace.

Because I Want To; Because I Must; Because Now And Forever More This Is Where I Belong To Be.

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He Was Like Someone Sleeping Who Woke Suddenly And Found The World...all The Beauty Of It, And The Sadness Too. The Hunger And The Thirst. Everything He Had Never Thought About Or Known Was There Before Him, And Magnified Into One Person Who By Chance, Or Fate--call It What You Will--happened To Be Me.

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When She Smiled It Was As Though She Embraced The World.

If You Think I'm One Of The People Who Try To Be Funny At Breakfast You're Wrong. I'm Invariably Illtempered In The Early Morning.

I Wondered How Many People There Were In The World Who Suffered, And Continued To Suffer, Because They Could Not Break Out From Their Own Web Of Shyness And Reserve, And In Their Blindness And Folly Built Up A Great Distorted Wall In Front Of Them That Hid The Truth.

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Happiness Is Not A Possession To Be Prized, It Is A Quality Of Thought, A State Of Mind.

A Dreamer, I Walked Enchanted, And Nothing Held Me Back.

You Had To Endure Something Yourself Before It Touched You.

Jem Was Safe From Her, And He Would Ride Away With A Song On His Lips And A Laugh At Her Expense, Forgetful Of Her, And Of His Brother, And Of God; While She Dragged Through The Years, Sullen And Bitter, The Stain Of Silence Marking Her, Coming In The End To Ridicule As A Soured Spinster Who Had Been Kissed Once In Her Life And Could Not Forget It.

He Had The Face Of One Who Walks In His Sleep, And For A Wild Moment The Idea Came To Me That Perhaps He Was Not Normal, Not Altogether Sane. There Were People Who Had Trances, I Had Surely Heard Of Them, And They Followed Strange Laws Of Which We Could Know Nothing, They Obeyed The Tangled Orders Of Their Own Sub-conscious Minds. Perhaps He Was One Of Them, And Here We Were Within Six Feet Of Death.

...as The Slow Sea Sucked At The Shore And Then Withdrew, Leaving The Strip Of Seaweed Bare And The Shingle Churned, The Sea Birds Raced And Ran Upon The Beaches. Then That Same Impulse To Flight Seized Upon Them Too. Crying, Whistling, Calling, They Skimmed The Placid Sea And Left The Shore. Make Haste, Make Speed, Hurry And Begone; Yet Where, And To What Purpose? The Restless Urge Of Autumn, Unsatisfying, Sad, Had Put A Spell Upon Them And They Must Flock, And Wheel, And Cry; They Must Spill Themselves Of Motion Before Winter Came.

People Who Mattered Could Not Take The Humdrum World. But This Was Not The World, It Was Enchantment; And All Of It Was Mine.

Come And See Us If You Feel Like It,' She Said. 'i Always Expect People To Ask Themselves. Life Is Too Short To Send Out Invitations.

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How Lacking In Intuition Men Could Be In Persuading Themselves That Mending Some Stranger's Socks, And Attending To His Comfort, Could Content A Woman.

She Had To Live In This Bright, Red Gabled House With The Nurse Until It Was Time For Her To Die... I Thought How Little We Know About The Feelings Of Old People. Children We Understand, Their Fears And Hopes And Make-believe.

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Time Will Mellow It, Make It A Moment For Laughter. But Now It Was Not Funny, Now I Did Not Laugh. It Was Not The Future, It Was The Present. It Was Too Vivid And Too Real.

If Only There Could Be An Invention That Bottled Up A Memory, Like Scent. And It Never Faded, And It Never Got Stale. And Then, When One Wanted It, The Bottle Could Be Uncorked, And It Would Be Like Living The Moment All Over Again.

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Why Did Dogs Make One Want To Cry? There Was Something So Quiet And Hopeless About Their Sympathy. Jasper, Knowing Something Was Wrong, As Dogs Always Do. Trunks Being Packed. Cars Being Brought To The Door. Dogs Standing With Drooping Tails, Dejected Eyes. Wandering Back To Their Baskets In The Hall When The Sound Of The Car Dies Away.

I Believe There Is A Theory That Men And Women Emerge Finer And Stronger After Suffering, An That To Advance In This Or Any World We Must Endure Ordeal By Fire." (from Rebecca)

There's Something About Paris That Gives You A Mental Slap All The Time, And You Can't Just Sit Still And Do Nothing. You've Got To Work, To Keep Up With The Pace, The Sting In The Atmosphere.

Living As We Do In An Age Of Noise And Bluster, Success Is Now Measured Accordingly. We Must All Be Seen, And Heard, And On The Air.

Here Was The Freedom I Desired, Long Sought-for, Not Yet Known Freedom To Write, To Walk, To Wander, Freedom To Climb Hills, To Pull A Boat, To Be Alone.

When One Is Writing A Novel In The First Person, One Must Be That Person.

I Am Glad It Cannot Happen Twice, The Fever Of First Love. For It Is A Fever, And A Burden, Too, Whatever The Poets May Say.

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All Whispers And Echoes From A Past That Is Gone Teem Into The Sleeper's Brain, And He Is With Them, And Part Of Them.

I Could Fight With The Living But I Could Not Fight The Dead. If There Was Some Woman In London That Maxim Loved, Someone He Wrote To, Visited, Dined With, Slept With, I Could Fight Her. We Would Stand On Common Ground. I Should Not Be Afraid. Anger And Jealousy Were Things That Could Be Conquered. One Day The Woman Would Grow Old Or Tired Or Different, And Maxim Would Not Love Her Anymore. But Rebecca Would Never Grow Old. Rebecca Would Always Be The Same. And She And I Could Not Fight. She Was To Strong For Me.

How Simple Life Becomes When Things Like Mirrors Are Forgotten.

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I Could Not Ask Forgiveness For Something I Had Not Done. As Scapegoat, I Could Only Bear The Fault.

He Lacked Tenderness; He Was Rude; And He Had More Than A Streak Of Cruelty In Him; He Was A Thief And A Liar. He Stood For Everything She Feared And Hated And Despised; But She Knew She Could Love Him... This Was No Choice Made With The Mind.

Will You Look Into My Eyes And Tell Me That You Love Me Now?

No, Mary Had No Illusions About Romance. Falling In Love Was A Pretty Name For It, That Was All.

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He Stole Horses' You'll Say To Yourself, 'and He Didn't Care For Women; And But For My Pride I'd Have Been With Him Now.

Life Was A Series Of Greetings And Farewells, One Was Always Saying Good-bye To Something, To Someone.

I Would Not Be Young Again, If You Offered Me The World. But Then I'm Prejudiced.' 'you Talk,' I Said, 'as If You Were Ninety-nine.' 'for A Woman I Very Nearly Am,' She Said. 'i'm Thirty Five.

And I Don't Like Books Which Are Full Of Name Dropping.

A Familiar Name On Its Own, However, Does Not Carry Its Bearer Far Unless The Talent Is There, And The Will To Work.

The Peace Of Manderley. The Quietude And The Grace. Whoever Lived Within Its Walls, Whatever Trouble There Was And Strife, However Much Uneasiness And Pain, No Matter What Tears Were Shed, What Sorrows Borne, The Peace Of Manderley Could Not Be Broken Or The Loveliness Destroyed.

People Who Travel Are Always Fugitives.

Last Night I Dreamt I Went To Manderley Again.

What About The Hero Of The House On The Strand? What Did It Mean When He Dropped The Telephone At The End Of The Book? I Don't Really Know, But I Rather Think He Was Going To Be Paralysed For Life. Don't You?

I Wish I Was A Woman Of About Thirty-six Dressed In Black Satin With A String Of Pearls.

When The Leaves Rustle, They Sound Very Much Like The Stealthy Movement Of A Woman In Evening Dress, And When They Shiver Suddenly, And Fall, And Scatter Away Along The Ground, They Might Be The Patter Of A Woman’s Hurrying Footsteps, And The Mark In The Gravel The Imprint Of A High-heeled Shoe.

No Person Will Ever Get Into My Blood As A Place Can ... People And Things Pass Away, But Not Places.

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