The moors of Cornwall are wild and untamed, a character unto itself, as if the horrors of the story spring from the land itself. Du Maurier never dispels the sense that this love is wrong, and that adds to the sense of disquiet, for even the one good thing in the story is corrupted.Īll of this is wrapped up in du Maurier’s beautiful prose and her superb mastery of the tale of the lonely, haunted house. It is also a love story, but a cynical one, for Mary falls in love with the wrong sort of man, and the wisdom of this love is highly dubious. It is her against the world, and so every oddity, every betrayal, every danger feels ten times worse, because there is no one she can trust, and there is nothing to fall back onto except her wits. As in Rebecca, her solitude is key to the story’s scariness. It is also the story of Mary’s psychological trauma as she is isolated in a cabin with a madman. It is a simple mystery story about Jamaica Inn that ends with a murder mystery to be unravelled. It is a story of domestic abuse, of forbidden and unwise love, of the horrors of being confined amongst dangerous people. It is the kind of scary, psychological thriller for which du Maurier is rightfully known.
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