MBTI Type: ISTJ

Mrs. Danvers measures everything according to its personal impact on herself. She loved Rebecca even more, because she raised her from childhood, as a mother-figure. She looks back with fondness on their memories together, the brushing of her hair, the laying out of her garments, the sharing of secrets and scorn for her lovers, whom Rebecca used and discarded. She intimidates the staff because “you know Mrs. Danvers, there’s a proper way to do everything.” She abides strongly by traditions, but often manipulates them to her own advantage (using gathering the staff to greet the new bride as an excuse to intimidate her and defy Maxim’s orders). She is an efficient and hard-nosed housekeeper, easily able to organize the staff and keep them in line, but intimidating to Mrs. de Winters because of her distant efficiency. She manipulates people for her own pleasure and to create tangible results—destroy the marriage she disapproves of and that has replaced her beloved Rebecca. She intimidates the new Mrs. De Winter through her insistence of clinging to the past and holding onto precedent; she organizes the house according to “how it has always been done,” asks the new lady of the house for information according to her new status (as a subtle way to manipulate and intimidate her, by reminding her that Rebecca did these things better), and has a meticulous way of doing things. Mrs. Danvers wallows in her own feelings about what happened, reacting to her own feelings at the expense of her employers, and lying to protect herself and make her mistress seem in the wrong. Her later actions, of what she chooses to do and how she punishes Maxim for his crime, betrayal her deep emotional attachment to a past that is dead and gone, and her unwillingness to live on without it. She follows the path well-worn for her, knowing manipulating the heroine into wearing the same dress to the ball will upset Maxim, rather than make him happy, but doesn’t have a good sense of the larger picture. It never occurs to her that Max might be guilty for Rebecca’s death until the inquest. Nor does she think the new lady of the house might have stolen, dropped, or lost the priceless figurine from the morning room. She is creative and creepy in how she imagines Rebecca is still living in the house, as a ghost, and watching her husband with his new wife. “What might she be thinking about you?” she asks.

Enneagram: 4w5

Mrs. Danver’s sin is “spite” and an unwillingness to move on; she has fixated on a dead woman for over a year and built her entire life around this loss, refusing to move past it, process it, or allow anyone else happiness because of her deep resentment at her absence. She poisons the well of the new Mrs. de Winter’s life, by being a constant reminder of a dead woman, intimidating her, bringing negativity into her sphere, and even attempting to convince her to kill herself—she hates Maxim marrying another, “inferior” model so much, she doesn’t want the new woman to live. She’s so self-centered and spiteful, she goes out of her way to try and ruin their marriage, intimidate the young bride, and cause friction between them, by persuading her to look like Rebecca at the ball (knowing it will upset Maxim and ruin their evening together). Like many 4s, she is living in the past and not dealing with the present or the future; and when she’s deprived of her home and learns that Maxim has gotten away with murder, she burns down his house, because “it was ours, it didn’t belong to him.” Her 5 wing is deeply withdrawn and focused on competency. She does everything in the house dutifully without becoming involved with the staff, and through minimizing her emotions outside of those she keeps warm for Rebecca. She is deeply private, secretive, and withdrawn, not wanting much for herself beyond a place to live and a purpose.

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