Director Roger Michell introduces My Cousin Rachel
‘Is Rachel bad or good? Innocent or guilty, carnal or ‘pure’? Or does the truth lie somewhere else? Is she an anachronism, full of life, possessed of sound mind and spirit, enjoying her sexu-ality as and where and with whomsoever she might wish, a woman in a man’s world, determined to escape from the limitations of both the period when the book is ostensibly set and those of when it was written?’
Daphne Du Maurier’s moody, mysterious My Cousin Rachel is now a major motion picture starring Rachel Weisz and Sam Claflin. Film director Roger Michell is a huge fan and penned an introduction to our special tie-in edition, detailing how he fell for Du Maurier’s writing and his interpretation of Rachel and the story. You can read the full foreword here.
My Cousin Rachel
by Daphne Du Maurier
I threw the piece of paper on the fire. She saw it burn . . .
Orphaned at an early age, Philip Ashley is raised by his benevolent older cousin, Ambrose. Resolutely single, Ambrose delights in Philip as his heir, a man who will love his grand home as much as he does himself. But the cosy world the two construct is shattered when Ambrose sets off on a trip to Florence. There he falls in love and marries - and there he dies suddenly.
In almost no time at all, the new widow - Philip's cousin Rachel - turns up in England. Despite himself, Philip is drawn to this beautiful, sophisticated, mysterious woman like a moth to the flame. And yet . . . might she have had a hand in Ambrose's death?
