Lecture: Daphne du Maurier and her Sisters
Past event archive
4 April 2013, 13:15
Ondaatje Wing Theatre
Free
- Lecture
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The story of celebrated novelist Daphne du Maurier and her remarkable sisters; Angela and Jeanne, will be revealed by biographer Jane Dunn. The middle sister in a celebrated artistic dynasty, Daphne du Maurier is the author of Rebecca, Jamaica Inn and My Cousin Rachel. Her success and fame were enhanced by films made of her novels and horrifying short stories including Don't Look Now and The Birds. However, this fame overshadowed her sisters Angela and Jeanne, a writer and an artist, living quiet lives even more unconventional than Daphne's own.
Dunn considers the siblings side by side, three sisters brought up in a glamorous theatrical family with a peculiar and powerful father. The inspiration for the sisters' work came from a shared pool of experience and fantasy, little altered by outside influences. This family dynamic at the heart of the hidden lives of Piffy, Bird and Bing (Angela, Jeanne and Daphne), encouraged their social non-conformity, creative energy and compulsive make-believe, their lives as psychologically complex as a Daphne du Maurier story.
Biographer Jane Dunn writes about women and their relationships, and sisters in particular. Her books include a biography of the sisters Virginia Woolf and Vanessa Bell and Elizabeth & Mary, which looks at the lives of the cousin queens Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and lives in Bath with her husband, the writer and linguist, Nicholas Ostler.
Daphne Du Maurier
by Dorothy Wilding
1949
NPG x19829
The story of celebrated novelist Daphne du Maurier and her remarkable sisters; Angela and Jeanne, will be revealed by biographer Jane Dunn. The middle sister in a celebrated artistic dynasty, Daphne du Maurier is the author of Rebecca, Jamaica Inn and My Cousin Rachel. Her success and fame were enhanced by films made of her novels and horrifying short stories including Don't Look Now and The Birds. However, this fame overshadowed her sisters Angela and Jeanne, a writer and an artist, living quiet lives even more unconventional than Daphne's own.
Dunn considers the siblings side by side, three sisters brought up in a glamorous theatrical family with a peculiar and powerful father. The inspiration for the sisters' work came from a shared pool of experience and fantasy, little altered by outside influences. This family dynamic at the heart of the hidden lives of Piffy, Bird and Bing (Angela, Jeanne and Daphne), encouraged their social non-conformity, creative energy and compulsive make-believe, their lives as psychologically complex as a Daphne du Maurier story.
Biographer Jane Dunn writes about women and their relationships, and sisters in particular. Her books include a biography of the sisters Virginia Woolf and Vanessa Bell and Elizabeth & Mary, which looks at the lives of the cousin queens Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and lives in Bath with her husband, the writer and linguist, Nicholas Ostler.
