Get hooked into du Maurier at this year’s festival

The Festival runs from 13-21 May in and around Fowey, near where Daphne du Maurier made her home at Menabilly, the main inspiration for Rebecca’s Manderley. 

An interesting fact about the author is that her father Sir Gerald du Maurier was a well-known actor and the first to take on the role as Captain Hook in J.M.Barrie’s classic Peter Pan. This year a theatre company who are based in the University of Exeter, are putting on a specially-commissioned play about the Du Maurier’s. “Father but for the grace of God,” is a drama which explores the relationship between the Du Maurier father and daughter. The theatre company, The Varadi Foundation will stage an intimate site specific performance written specifically for the Fowey Hotel’s Piano Room on Tuesday 18 and Wednesday 19 May at 11.45am and 3.15pm.

The Varadi Foundation’s Mick Mangan, who is Professor of Drama at the University of Exeter, said, ‘We are performing in the Fowey Hotel, across the estuary from Daphne’s beloved ‘Ferryside’ home. It’s a play about haunting and memories, about love and disillusionment. It’s also about childhood, imagination and growing up.  

 He added, ‘Daphne described her father’s performance of Hook as “a tragic and rather ghastly creation who knew no peace and whose soul was in torment”. The play explores the darker side of make-believe, and is given additional depth through a musical score especially composed by the University’s Director of Music, Marion Wood.’

Kits Browning, Du Maurier’s son lives in Bodinnick at ‘Ferryside’ which over looks the Fowey Harbor. He retains a positive relationship with the University which has a long association with the Du Maurier family with a loan of family papers within its Special Collections. One of the buildings at the Cornwall Campus was named in honour of Daphne du Maurier. The University is also delighted to be a regular contributor to the festival.

Expert on Daphne du Maurier and University Arts and Culture Development Fellow, Professor Helen Taylor said, ‘This year we launched our new Arts and Culture Strategy, and we’re delighted to confirm and expand our longstanding collaboration with the Du Maurier Festival. 14 University staff will be speaking or chairing events throughout the Festival, and we’ve added a festival-within-a-festival on our Cornwall Campus.  This reflects our desire to widen the offering of first-class events to people in the Falmouth area, as well as our students and staff.’

She added, ‘Highlights of the day are “Captain Corelli’s Mandolin” author Louis de Bernières playing mandolin with The Antonius Quartet as well as bestselling novelist Sarah Dunant on her new Italian Renaissance novel, “Sacred Hearts,”. There’ll also be talks from experts on John Keats the Westcountryman, Sabine Baring-Gould and the werewolf, the women of Cornwall’s scientific revolution, and myths of wrecking, smuggling and piracy.’

This all-day event at the Cornwall Campus, Penryn on Sat 22nd May is on from 11:30am – 8pm.

Other highlights at the festival include a repeat of last year’s successful University of Exeter Sessions about authors from Devon and Cornwall who have written extensively about the region. This year subjects include Virginia Woolf’s Eden Project, Tolkein in Cornwall and Writers and the Sea. They take place in Fowey Town Hall on Tuesday 18th May and Wednesday 19th May.

The University’s Writer in Residence and BBC Producer Paul Dodgson will hold two seminars on life writing.

Appearing in the Festival Village will be University figures Booker Prize-shortlisted Philip Hensher and screenwriter Sam North.