The Scapegoat by Daphne Du Maurier - Essay Example

? The Scapegoat An English Female Daphne Du Maurier wrote the book “The Scapegoat” in 1957. In 1959, a film was made on the novel with same name. There are two main characters in this book John and Jean. John an English man who is lonely, miserable and wants to be French, speaks in the book as first person. He is seriously thinking to change his life altogether and becoming a “Trappist Monk”. While visiting France he meets a person Jean who is exactly similar to him. The circumstances force both of them to interchange places and Jean steals identity of John. The Englishman John is a simple and lonely person who is academic in nature. He soon finds himself struck up in the complex and different life of another family. He faces a variety of perplexing roles - as owner of a chateau, director of a failing business, head of a fractious family, and master of nothing. The Scapegoat is a masterpiece exploration of doubling and identity, and of the dark side of the self. John meets his exact double jean in a railway station, at first, both are surprised but later they agree to sit and drink together. While talking John gets over drunk and once he wakes up in a hotel room, he finds that his clothes have been swapped with Jean, his identity has been stolen by him and the double has vanished. Soon the driver of Jean comes to hotel to pick him up. John is unable to convince the driver that he is not Jean. The driver thinks he is drunk and takes him along to Jean de Gue’s chateau. Now John decides to live the life of Jean, as he always wanted a change in his boring life. The family of Jean assumes him as Jean. They expect him to continue running the family glass-making business and arranging shooting parties – things that John has absolutely no experience in.  Before long, it starts to become obvious that Jean is using John as a scapegoat. Jean’s family and business are both in a mess and he wants someone else to have to deal with them. John goes completely unprepared into Jean’s life. Jean has a chateau, a glassworks, a wife, a mistress, a lover, a brother, a mother, a daughter and a sister who has not spoken to him for fifteen years. When John arrives at the house of Jean, he finds it very difficult to run the affairs but eventually understands every character around him and their relationship to Jean. From the neglected pregnant wife and the hostile elder sister to the resentful younger brother and the religious ten-year-old daughter, every character is well explained and memorable. The story takes place over one very intense week in which John tries to correct the mismanagement in life, business and family done by Jean. It is only the dog of Jean who knows that John is not Jean and barks at him. John deals the life better than Jean. On the business side, John renews the glass contract and saves business. In family, he tries to re-connect and build relation with wife, children mother and sister. He saves life of the child trying to jump out of window, saves the pregnant wife and the baby and stops drug addiction of mother. After reading about death of a family member in the newspaper, Jean gives a telephone call to John and returns. Jean is surprised to see the way John managed his problems. Jean tells him that he remained in London in John’s flat and sold his flat while clearing his debts. Jean now suspects that John might want to keep his wealth and family but John say he only loved all this and leaves quietly out of the life of Jean. Function of each character in group The story revolves around two characters John and Jean. Jean makes a scapegoat of John. In the words of common street people, Jean can be called a doppelganger. Jean is Frenchman who is incapable of handling his life. He is charming, idle, and destructive French aristocrat. His character has many functions like; master of a chateau, director of a failing business, head of a large and embittered family, and keeper of too many secrets. He has a glass factory and cannot run it properly. He has a pregnant wife, child, sister, mother and brother but cannot handle the relation ships. There is a gulf of silence between Jean and his wife, which shows social mis-adjustment of his personality. Jean had married his wife on conditions of getting heirs for the property which is again a selfish approach. The agreement between husband and wife is hidden. In the novel many people are scapegoat-ing each other. The weaknesses in Jean were overcome by John within one week and when John leaves, it is an uphill task for Jean to maintain what John accomplished. One of the characters Bela who comes to know about reality of John says that now John has acted so well and nobly that from now on Jean’s family would look for John’s character inside Jean’s, not the other way around. Going forward Jean will have to try to live up to John’s precedent and the family will have to stand up to him if he does not. In the end Jean, returns to his family without anybody knowing what happened during last week except one Bela. John is an Englishman who is unhappy with his bore life of History Lecturer. He thinks that he is living a lonely life away from people. He considers himself impractical and failure. He wishes he could be free from his personality and circumstances. In his hopelessness, John is planning to visit a monastery in a last ditch effort to find a solution. Instead, he is driven into life of Jean who is his double. In the process, he changes hopelessness in his life and gives meaning of life to family and business of Jean. Personality of John is charismatic, promising, selfless and kind. His actions start a series of interconnected events during which true nature of other characters is revealed. John saves the life of Jean’s child, he reconnects with his wife and sister, he motivates Jean’s mother to quit drugs, he supports failing glass business of Jean and revives the contract. Although Jean uses John as a scapegoat, John replies this with good deeds. John does not take revenge from Jean because he likes the good change in life and sees an opportunity to do good for a family. In the character and functions of John, we see love, care, emotion, livelihood, passion, humanity, kindness, gentleness, resourcefulness, intelligence, management and usefulness for society. His character reveals that a bad action can be returned with a good one. Application of a key theoretical concept to the events/characters in book The key theoretical concept used in events and characters originate from scapegoat-ing of John by Jean. This first action in the novel then revolves around subject of human relationships. The opening is shorter and leads the reader directly into the deception and scapegoat drama. Rest of the events and characters in the book of management of one single act done initially by jean. Novel is full of suspense, deceit, lies, coincidence, and secrets. As the novel unfolds, the reader is attracted by suspense and crime. The concept of story also revolves around fiction in which one person replaces another without the family noticing any change. The story is about exploring ones dark self. The novel is written on the lines of detective fiction in which a new episode is revealed after every turn. Although the period covered is physically one week, it appears much longer to the reader. The puzzle about each character unfolds to the reader much before John. There is another dimension of human relationships in the novel, that is intensity of Marie-Noel relationship to her father. It is believed that the author has reflected her image in the character since he had an intense relationship with her father. Marie-Noel’s spirit of sacrifice also qualifies her to be a scapegoat. The novel is filled with suspense, deception and scapegoat-ing. The story is mainly related to characters of two men with minute details. One thing very interesting is that everybody in the house has secrets. The secrets which are somehow un folded within a week . A strange thing is the polite and clean exchange of places between John and Jean once again at the end. John is kind enough not to take away any wealth or relation ship out of Jean’s life. It is again about kindness and humanity of a person who was deceived and wronged. To summarize the story revolves around scapegoat-ing , secrets and human interactions. It tells how complex relationships could be within a small family. Works Cited The Scapegoat by Daphne Du Maurier, googlebooks.com. Web. 8 May 2011 Read More