The Parasites – Daphne du Maurier (1949)

My third read for #DDMreadingweek was Daphne du Maurier’s 1949 novel The Parasites which is considered to be fairly autobiographical. Again, it is quite different to the other two books of hers I have just read, and different again to those I read last year. My reading has inadvertently led me to explore different sides of the writing of Daphne du Maurier and I have found I like it all. I like the chilling, unsettling nature of her shorter fiction, the historical novels like The House on the Strand, the gothic drama of Rebecca, and the slower paced novels with a strong sense of place like The Flight of the Falcon. In a way The Parasites is like none of those. It is a less dramatic work, and yet there are small moments of drama – as this is the story of a family, and there is some drama in every family. This family though, like du Maurier’s own, is a theatrical family.

“Once a person gave his talent to the world, the world put a stamp upon it. The talent was not a personal possession anymore. It was something to be traded, bought and sold. It fetched a high price, or a low one. It was kicked in the common market.”

The Delaneys; Maria, Niall and Celia grew up in the shadow of their famous parents. Pappy: their father, a singer, a character loved by audiences who is larger than life and Mama a dancer. Brought up together from the earliest childhood, the three are not full siblings. Maria Pappy’s child from a previous liaison, Niall Mama’s son from her previous relationship. Celia the youngest is the child they had together. Niall and Maria despite having no blood tie have always had a strong bond, an understanding existing between them that left everyone else out. Celia feels her connection to the other two strongly, but she is always just a little on the outside. 

The novel opens when the three siblings are grown up, they are all clearly in their thirties, Maria is a mother, married to Charles Wyndham. A typical lazy Sunday afternoon with Maria, Niall and Celia together for the weekend, at Farthings, the Wyndham family home. The children are out of sight – cared for by their nanny Polly – the adults chatter idly as they lounge around. Maria is an actress, Niall a song writer, while Celia’s own ambitions of writing and illustrating stories, is always being put on hold as she rushes to lend whatever support her family needs. Suddenly, Charles explodes into irritated anger, calling the three of them parasites – shocking them into silence and then reminiscence.

‘And that’s what you are, the three of you. Parasites. The whole bunch. You always have been and you always will be. Nothing can change you. You are doubly, triply parasitic: first, because you traded ever since childhood on that seed of talent you had the luck to inherit from your fantastic forebears: secondly, because you’ve none of you done a stroke of ordinary honest work in your lives, but batten upon us, the fool public who allow you to exist; and thirdly, because you prey upon each other, the three of you, living in a world of fantasy which you have created for yourselves and which bears no relation to anything in heaven or on earth.’

The narrator is interesting, each of the three siblings are spoken about in the third person, by a collective we. Cleverly, du Maurier never lets this narrative voice intrude too much – and it certainly helps to portray the Delaneys as a unit.  

We return to the Delaneys in childhood – a childhood that included late nights at the theatre with their parents, piling into European hotels showering the reception area with bag and baggage and even pets. Their childhood unconventional and rackety – their education rather erratic. The faithful Truda is always with them – the entire family rely on her sensible no nonsense management. The children are always together – they are of similar ages and have no need of other children. They enjoy vicariously the adulation bestowed upon their parents – as they too worship the wonderful Delaneys from the wings. As the children are just entering their teenage years, a tragedy brings the life they have all known thus far to an abrupt stop.

“Grown-up people. … How suddenly would it happen, the final plunge into their world? Did it really come about overnight, as Pappy said, between sleeping and waking? A day would come, a day like any other day, and looking over your shoulder you would see the shadow of the child that was, receding; and there would be no going back, no possibility of recapturing the shadow. You had to go on; you had to step forward into the future, however much you dreaded the thought, however much you were afraid.”

Maria goes on to the stage, selfish and too used to the attention of others, attention she still craves. Niall – never very confident of his own abilities, is lazy and unambitious, at eighteen he begins a relationship with Freada a woman who was once a friend of his mother’s. Celia never achieves what she might have been able to because she spends too much time looking after others. She is quite needy and revels in the company of Maria and Niall, though her kindness to her family is at some sacrifice to herself. Maria marries Charles as she rather likes the idea of being an honourable. Neither of the other two marry – Maria spends the week in London at the theatre, her children and their father remain in the country – each week, all three of the adult Delaney siblings arrive at the family home for the weekend. In a sense the three of them never really grew up, they are each quite flawed – connected strongly by their shared childhood which was so much removed from anyone outside of the Delaney bubble.  

The Parasites is a great exploration of character and the strong ties that connect an unconventional family to one another. It’s certainly different to other du Maurier books but I enjoyed it very much, a well written psychological exploration that is actually rather compelling.