A Memory Of My Past As A Guide To The Future

I am at that time in life when I am looking back at where I have come from, some of the people that I have met along the way, the impression that they made on me.

One memory is that of Daphne Du Maurier, author of Rebecca, Jamaica Inn, The Birds and other modern literary classics. My home was near to Menabilly House in Cornwall, the reputed inspiration for Manderley. I used to walk across the estate, a teenager in search of meaning, lost in my own fantasy land.

Cornwall, the home of my fathers, a finger of land seemingly pointing westward towards the New World, is the perfect place to live if you are a writer. The softer south coast, facing the English Channel with the wilder, more rugged north coast hammered by the harsh Atlantic ocean. You are never far from the sea, wherever you live, and the contrasts challenge you. The combination of low scudding cloud cast from the seas, crouched trees and the threat of rain always bring you back into the moment.

When I first met Dame du Maurier, she was in her 60s, attired in that louche clothing style so adored by the English country classes, jodphurs, green wellington boots and hand knits, driving a very battered Morris Minor Countryman shooting brake.

Our local grocer in Par was a hangover from a previous age: Victorian in style, with tins, glass jars, loose fruits and vegetables, spices with odours that stimulated your senses. A practical no-nonsense shopkeeper offering a low key shopping experience. She was often there as I collected my parents' food orders.

The lady had no airs or graces, living a normal life in her community. These days, I guess, such a life would be very difficult to sustain: I treasured the few words that she directed my way to the point that I am recalling them today.

On my travels back to boarding school, we used to pass Jamaica Inn (it actually exists) seemingly dropped in the middle of Bodmin Moor. An uninviting place of rest, virtually treeless, continually windswept, you can imagine the smugglers and the many nefarious creatures that inhabited that God forsaken place. 

Nearby, Dozmary Pool, the legendary lake into which Excalibur was cast, completes the picture of an otherworldly landscape. 

However, it was on my walks across the Menabilly Estate from home, round the Gribbin peninsular to Fowey, that I would dream my dreams. The screeching of the gulls, the whip of the sea wind, the saltiness on your lips, all conspired to make you aware of your very being. You could not escape the sense that you were physical, assailed, by sound and movement.

I first met the world renowned author when she was completing The House On The Strand, based on the area of Par where the sea has receded allowing the hamlet to be established. The adjacent hamlet of Tywardreath, set up on the hill behind Par, has an older history and it was there that she used the altered geography as the backdrop for that story. I was fascinated by her research and, of course, I read the book when it was published in 1969.

However, a gentleman never breaks a lady's confidences. 

How times have changed ....