They were all fitting into place, the jig-saw pieces. The odd strained shapes that I had tried to piece together with my fumbling fingers and they had never fitted. Frank's odd manner when I spoke about Rebecca. Beatrice and her rather diffident negative attitude. The silence that I had always taken for sympathy and regret was a silence born of shame and embarrassment. It seemed incredible to me now that I had never understood. I wondered how many people there were in the world who suffered, and continued to suffer, because they could not break out from their own web of shyness and reserve, and in their blindness and folly built up a great wall in front of them that hid the truth. This was what I had done. I had built up false pictures in my mind and sat before them. I had never had the courage to demand the truth. Had I made one step forward out of my own shyness Maxim would have told these things four months, five months ago. Daphne Du Maurier
About This Quote

In this quote from Henry James “The American”, the narrator is discussing with his friend, Maximilian de Winter about how he had been married to a woman whom he had not married. He tells his friend that he considered her a stranger and a stranger was a dangerous thing for a man to be. It would lead him to do things that were not necessarily in his best interest. He thought that marriage was something that was meant to be done between two people who were willing to commit themselves to each other and they should do so freely and openly.

He kept his wife in the dark about many things and hence she felt like she did not know him at all. He was afraid of what she would find out if she knew everything about him and yet he would not commit fully to her.

Source: Rebecca

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More Quotes By Daphne Du Maurier
  1. I suppose sooner or later in the life of everyone comes a moment of trial. We all of us have our particular devil who rides us and torments us, and we must give battle in the end.
  2. Either you go to America with Mrs. Van Hopper or you come home to Manderley with me."" Do you mean you want a secretary or something?"" No, I'm asking you to marry me, you little fool.
  3. I wondered how many people there were in the world who suffered, and continued to suffer, because they could not break out from their own web of shyness and reserve, and in their blindness and folly built up a great distorted wall in front of...
  4. They were all fitting into place, the jig-saw pieces. The odd strained shapes that I had tried to piece together with my fumbling fingers and they had never fitted. Frank's odd manner when I spoke about Rebecca. Beatrice and her rather diffident negative attitude. <span...
  5. Truth was something intangible, unseen, which sometimes we stumbled upon and did not recognize, but was found, and held, and understood only by old people near their death, or sometimes by the very pure, the very young.
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