The Scapegoat (Virago Modern Classics)

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which of these two men's life sounds most attractive to you? Would you rather be without a family, with no responsibilities, but also feel lonely, depressed and empty? And if you could step into one of these men's lives - by trading places --as a stranger/ actor taking over the role.... how do you think you might make a difference? And how might you do harm? In THIS story...we get the opportunity to watch how the entire scenario - this crazy game - so to speak - affects each person. When John first stepped into Jean de Gue's life, he noticed that his mother looked frightened. His sister silent. His brother hostile. His sister-in-law angry. His wife crying, and his daughter threw a tantrum. The dog, ignored him.

I could not ask for forgiveness for something I had not done. As scapegoat, I could only bear the fault. Will John fool them all and turn his madcap Shadow's Evil plans into Good - and finally give his own life purpose in the process? The hero is an English history professor, depressed and disillusioned, on vacation in Le Mans. He is lost and thinks of retiring to the trap. But, at the station, he meets a man who resembles him. After a night of drinking, he finds himself having to take on the identity of this man, an earl caught in financial and domestic trouble. In a few months, he will straighten out the collapsing factory, restore meaning to his brother's life, and taste the sweetness of his daughter's affection and the tenderness of his mistress. Jean de Gue's voice changed - its clear he had personal problems too - felt resentment. He said he had a sister who only thinks about religion and nothing else. And another biographer, Margaret Forster, reprints a letter, which Daphne du Maurier wrote in the same year of The Scapegoat's publication, 1957, just after her (Daphne's) husband Tommy had had a nervous breakdown. She herself was also on the verge of nervous collapse. In it, she talks about her novel,I was an alien, I was not one of them. Years of study, years of training, the fluency with which I spoke their language, taught their history, described their culture, had never brought me closer to the people themselves. Which doesn’t mean this novel is not good — I think it’s pretty damn good. And I am glad I read it. 😊

Gaston’s wife, who wept upon the instant, said to me, ‘Death is beautiful. Madame Jean might be an angel in the sky.’ I did not agree. Death was an executioner, lopping a flower before it bloomed. The sky had glories enough, but not the soil.” Additionally, National Review criticized the unrealistic actions of the narrator. Still, the reviewer appreciated the emotional complexity of the characters and understanding the narrator's action related to his deepest desire. I walked on through darkness, undergrowth and moss, and now I had no present and no past, the self who stumbled had no heart and mind..." I could not ask forgiveness for something I had not done. As scapegoat, I could only bear the fault. The Scapegoat is a hidden gem buried deep within Du Maurier’s chest of treasure. Prepare to be astounded.The Forest closed in upon us, not a forbidding darkness but golden green, a tangle of oak, hornbeam, chestnut, beech - all the trees whose leaf gives light instead of shadow, whose branches spread with time, whose stems grow paler." (du Maurier 96)