Enchanted Cornwall: Her Pictorial Memoir

Enchanted Cornwall: Her Pictorial Memoir
by Daphne DuMaurier [914.23 DuM]

I picked up this photograph filled memoir by one of my favorite authors. Daphne Du Maurier tells the story of how she first came to Cornwall on a holiday with her mother and her sister Jeanne when she was nineteen. They stayed at a farm in Cumberland and Du Maurier writes "earlier holidays could not compare with this my first experience of rugged scenery, of running water coursing through the hills down to the lake." It was love at first sight. Later that year Du Maurier, her mother and two sisters returned to Cornwall to buy a house to use for their holidays. They settled on Ferryside near the village of Fowey. After the house was renovated, twenty-year-old Daphne moved in to pursue her writing career. She roamed the hills and sailed along the Cornish coast soaking up the atmosphere and finding inspiration for her novels. It was on one of her walks that she found Menabilly, a deserted manor hidden away down a long driveway. This house was the model for Manderlay in Rebecca and for the estate in My Cousin Rachel. Du Maurier found Jamaica Inn, the setting for her book with the same name by accident. Daphne Du Maurier and her friend Foy Quiller-Couch were out riding and got lost in the dark, desolate Bodmin Moor. They stumbled upon the inn. Once inside, Daphne and Foy learned stories about smuggling, wrecking and legends of the Moors. The entertaining glimpses of Du Maurier's past is illustrated will color photographs taken by Nick Wright. -- recommended by Donna G. - Virtual Services Department

[ official www.dumaurier.org web site ]

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