Virago Modern Classics (the publisher of Women's Literature) has in recent years republished the entire works of Daphne Du Maurier, described by author Sally Beauman as "one of the twentieth centuries most misunderstood and fascinating novelists".
"The House on the Strand" is described on the back cover of its latest reprint as a book "written in the great tradition of Edgar Allan Poe and H P Lovecraft" (see my previous post). However, although a finely crafted page turner, I would suggest it lack's the sense of menace and sheer terror associated with Poe and and Lovecraft's work. This said, the book is still an excellent read, and the characterisation cleverly and poignantly wrought.
It is not without irony that whilst "The House on the Strand" has been re-published by Virago, Du Maurier writes from the first person perspective of her central male character, Dick. Although, on one level, a deeply tragic story, this novel is also genuinely humorous, not least because Dick's drug-induced trips - from which finally he cannot return - bring to this middle aged man some symptoms which many women associate with the so-called "change of life".
However, the changes wrought in Dick's life are rather more dramatic as he journeys back to fourteenth century Cornwall and becomes more and more involved with the lives of the characters from this earlier period, gradually losing touch with present reality.
Like Lovecroft's "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward", Du Maurier's novel is rooted in a particulary powerful sense of place, and it is from this, as much from its characters and story that the sense of dark predestination associated with the best modern Gothic literature derives. As with Lovecroft's work, antiquarian research is also central to the plot of "The House on the Strand", reflecting the shared heritage of both writers.
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