Mary Anne (1954)

Although I would have previously sworn that it was impossible for du Maurier to write a bad book, this one comes periously close and although it had all the right elements; good story, fascinating real life people, great period setting, royalty, scandal etc it just never really came together for me. It felt disjointed, uneven, lacking in emotion and with a lacklustre, prosaic feel that du Mauriers other books just don't have. I missed her lyrical descriptions. I also struggled to sympathise with Mary Anne, and by the end I positively disliked her, not caring one bit about her fate. Disappointingly, the narrative was a strange and uncomfortable mix of historical fiction and biography which never quite reached it's potential and in the end left me wanting more of both.

However, this is Daphne du Maurier we're talking about so even a 'meh' book by her is better than a lot of others out there. Just don't expect another Rebecca or Frenchman's Creek or My Cousin Rachel etc.

Buddy read with Kim. ( )

This is the story of Daphne du Maurier’s great-great-grandmother, Mary Anne Clarke, born into a poor family in the East End of London, married at fifteen and the mother of four children by the time she was twenty-three. Mary Anne became a notorious courtesan and mistress of the Duke of York and was later the central figure in a political corruption scandal, the repercussions of which ultimately led to her downfall.

According to Lisa Hilton, who wrote the introduction to the 2003 Virago edition, du Maurier did not much care for Mary Anne. She wrote that it was “lacking in human interest and reads like a newspaper report”. To some extent du Maurier was right. While it’s not really devoid of human interest, neither Mary Anne nor most of the other characters are particularly sympathetic. Although what motivates Mary Anne to behave in the way she does is understandable, it does not make her likeable. Further, much of the latter part of the book reads like transcripts from the parliamentary inquiry at which she gave evidence and the various trials in which she was involved.

The outcome of this is an uneven tone. Part of the book reads like a novel and part of it reads like a biography. The writing is excellent, but the two parts of the book feel quite separate. It may be the lawyer in me, but I found the parliamentary inquiry and the trials incredibly interesting. However, I really would have liked a bibliography or at the very least an author’s note discussing the primary sources and explaining what is fact and what is fiction. What I would have liked even more, I think, is an actual biography, rather than historical fiction. If du Maurier had written a biography about her ancestor, this might have been a much better book. It could have been the [b:Georgiana: Duchess of Devonshire|319300|Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire|Amanda Foreman|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1332041559s/319300.jpg|578160] of its time.

Still, I don’t regret the time I’ve spent reading Mary Anne. In spite of its weaknesses, the book still demonstrates du Maurier’s consummate skill as a writer. She was able to create a sense of place and time without resorting to archaic vocabulary. The central characters – for all they are mostly unlikeable - are vividly realised and never feel like transplants from du Maurier’s time. There were also moments of wonderfully written sly humour.

For me, this was a 3-1/2 star read. It gets half a star because I found the content about the parliamentary inquiry and the legal system so very interesting. Another buddy read with my friend Jemidar.
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Knowing that the story was based on du Maurier's grandmother's life made it interesting, but if I hadn't known that, I think I wouldn't have enjoyed it as much. It was as if her usual fluid story-telling became bogged down by the facts, but it is an amazing story to have in one's family history. ( )

Can't quite decide between 3 & 4 stars. This tells the tale of Du Maurier's great great grandmother, Mary Anne Clarke, who was mistress to the Duke of York. She was then pivotal in the investigation into the sale of commissions that took place in the House of Commons. A novelised biography, the first sections chart her upbringing in London poverty, then her hasty marriage and subsequent struggles with a lacklustre drunk of a husband. This wasnlt the life she wanted when she was in poveryt, and so her ambition rises still further. She eventually leaves him and finds her way to be mistress of the Duke of York. And here, she does actually seem to be happy, although there are perenial money problems, which is, in part, leads her into the murky issue of selling commisions. She takes a sum of money to put a name forward for a comission or exchange within the armed forces, of which the Duke is Commander in Chief. It is illegal, but it's not exactly unusual at this time in history. It all then starts to go down hill after she ceases her relationship with the Duke. There are the debts, the inability to maintain the standard of living to which she'd become accustomed. This all leads her into increasingly desparate ways of extracting money from old acquaintances, including the writing of defamatory pamphlets. This ends with a court case and the ultimate downfall. It's an interesting sotry, although the sections leading up to her period as mistress are more interesting, surprising and enjoyable to read than the book thereafter. The fall is, in part, due to her own inability to compromise and moderate herself. She thinks she has been hard done by, and never blames herself for a single part of what happens to her. But she never makes any attempt to plan for the future - she always lives for the day. This has its consequences. ( )

A strange novel,the story told in a rather hurried, precied way, perhaps echoing the impatience of Mary Anne herself, who kept herself and her family by entertaining lovers and brokering promotions.

Du Maurier appeared to have researched deeply her great-great-grandmother's life, especially the way she made and frittered money. But I didn't feel she showed exactly why her relative captivated practically every man who crossed her path. ( )