Rebecca (novel) Rebecca (novel) Rebecca is a Gothic novel by English author Dame Daphne du Maurier. A best-seller, "Rebecca" sold 2,829,313 copies between its publication in 1938 and 1965, and the book has never gone out of print. The novel is remembered especially for the character Mrs Danvers, the fictional estate Manderley, and its opening line: While working as the companion to a rich American woman on holiday in Monte Carlo, the unnamed narrator, a naïve young woman in her early 20s, becomes acquainted with a wealthy Englishman, George Fortescue Maximilian “Maxim” de Winter, a 42-year-old widower. After a fortnight of courtship,
Daphne du Maurier du Maurier (1946–69). When she was elevated to the Order of the British Empire as Dame Commander in 1969, she was titled Lady Browning; Dame Daphne du Maurier DBE (1969–89), but she never used the title. According to her biographer Margaret Forster, she told no one about the honour, so that even her children learned of it only from the newspapers. "She thought of pleading illness for the investiture, until her children insisted it would be a great day for the older grandchildren. So she went through with it, though she slipped out quietly afterwards to avoid the attention of