Is Gothic literature dead?

[Desdemona]

[quote=Monique Devereaux]

I've always found it fascinating that "Rebecca," the novel that essentially crystallized the genre for 20th century readers, actually has such a strange, unsatisfying romance at the heart of it. Maxim is a deeply troubled fellow, and at the end of the book, there aren't happy years ahead for these two. Likewise, he never really pays for his wrongdoing. Du Maurier also provided an unsettling "happy" ending for "Jamaica Inn," another work that helped establish the genre. Du Maurier said of "Rebecca" that she was shocked when people took it for a romance, since she saw it as a work about hate. Mrs. Danvers is perhaps the most passionate person in the novel; trouble is, her romantic attachment appears to be a dead, manipulative woman.

I recently watched Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca. It's a testament to the acting of Joan Fontaine and Laurence Olivier that I was actually moved by the story. They are rather flat and frustrating characters in print, but I felt that the portrayals were passionate, especially Olivier's. If anyone can make Maxim into a sympathetic character, it's Olivier.

(I would add that, in addition to Mrs. Danvers, Rebecca was the another passionate character in the book...but she's dead!)