We hope the example of Daphne's family will encourage you to post on this webpage your favourite lines other than the universally well-loved opening to Rebecca. Perhaps you'll be inspired to re-read her books and discover other lines with a special meaning for you.

Virago Press has published almost thirty of Daphne's books in paperback with a delightful hardback edition of Vanishing Cornwall. These have introductions by established authors, some of whom have presented at our Festival and submitted their own favourite lines below.

If you have already REGISTERED as a Member, please use the SUBMIT form to send your favourite lines to us, where they will be reviewed by Ann Willmore.

"Your Favourite Lines" is based on an original idea by Collin Langley.

Nil Korkut
Frenchman's Creek

And all this, she thought, is only momentary, is only a fragment in time that will never come again, for yesterday already belongs to the past and is ours no longer, and tomorrow is an unknown thing that may be hostile. This is our day, our moment, the sun belongs to us, and the wind, and the sea, and the men for'ard there singing on the deck. This day is forever a day to be held and cherished, because in it we shall have lived, and loved, and nothing else matters but that, in this world of our own making to which we have escaped.
Frenchman's Creek Ch.15, p.143, Virago (2003).

Frenchman's Creek has a special place in my heart. It is a novel I first read and loved as a teenager, and each time I return to it, I have this slightly unreasonable fear that maybe this time the magic will be gone. But thankfully, I am always wrong, and there is always the same fascination. The lines I quote describe Donna's heightened feelings following her perfect adventure with the Frenchman. They are my favourite lines because they capture in a few sentences the whole mood of the novel. The spirit of adventure, the courage to do what you feel is right, the ability to feel intensely, and the value of a moment's happiness – all of this is here in these lines. As always, du Maurier's prose is so eloquent, and the vicarious thrill we get out of Donna's adventure definitely has a cathartic effect.
Nil Korkut (Turkey).

Charles Richard Brown
Mary Anne

She went and sat on the steps of St Martin's Church, hemmed in by grumbling men and weary women, crying children pressing against her knees, all of them huddled together for greater warmth, defeating the gusts of wind and the slanting rain.
A woman beside her offered her bread-and-cheese, and a man on the other side a swig of beer. 'Here's luck all round,' she said, and somebody laughed, and the sun came out and one of them started singing. She thought of her vestal virgins in Boulogne and George in his regimentals, stiff and pompous, and suddenly none of them mattered, not even George; she was home where she belonged, in the heart of London.
Mary Anne, Part 4, Ch.6, p.384/5, Virago (2003).

I echo the sentiments of Caroline Metcalfe as I, too, love the end of Mary Anne. But I think that the few previous sentences are just as apposite and enhance Caroline Metcalfe's choice. Mary Anne is my favourite Daphne du Maurier book - though I haven't read many - as it is based upon Regency times and London - two of my pet interests. The story is one of rags to riches to disgrace; and Mary is based upon the great-great grandmother of Daphne du Maurier.
Charles Richard Brown.

Sylvia Wiltshire
Letters from Menabilly: Portrait of a Friendship

'It's drab and dreary down here, and you are missing nothing, not even the Spirit moving on the face of the Waters.'
'The Spirit moving on the Waters' was the name Bing had given to a certain light which, after a stormy day, streamed down its bright ribbons upon the sea. It was supremely beautiful, and I hoped it would appear on my visits, but like all strange and lovely things, it could not be commanded at will.
Letters From Menabilly: Portrait of a Friendship, p34/35, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, (1993).

This passage always comes to mind when I am on our boat, 'La Mouette', or walking along the coastline. I have on occasions seen 'The Spirit on the Waters' and as Oriel wrote it is supremely beautiful.
Sylvia Wiltshire.

Letters From Menabilly: Portrait of a Friendship edited by Oriel Malet is a volume of the correspondence between Daphne du Maurier and Oriel Malet. Bing is one of Daphne du Maurier's nicknames. AW.

Jane Dunn
Myself When Young

I arrived home in time for D's and M's silver wedding, and there was something strangely touching about the occasion, because of the gifts they gave each other. M had gone to so much trouble to have her portrait painted, and the sad thing was that, as she uncovered it, we could see from D's face he didn't care for it at all. It was not even a good likeness. Eager to produce his own present, he unwrapped a bracelet to put on her wrist. It was too small. "Oh dear, it was so pathetic. And yet slightly absurd and somehow perfect at the same time," says the diary, and when we three sisters had presented our parents with a huge potted azalea we all went off to a family celebration lunch at the Savoy.
Myself When Young, Ch.5, Between Two Worlds, p.134/5, Virago (2004).

My favourite du Maurier lines have to be when Daphne reveals her deep love for Cornwall or an ancient sleeping-beauty of a house, both passions I, and many, share. But her unsentimental take on human character time and again pulls me up short with the singularity of her point of view.
This extract is a wonderful sketch of a marriage, so full of pathos and yet unexpectedly funny too. It illustrates so well Daphne's cool detached gaze, even when young, on something as intimate and emotionally fraught as one's parents' misunderstanding of each other. In a few deft, economical lines she suggests the relationship of two narcissists who look to each other for reflections of themselves, yet somehow muddle on in affection and familiarity, glossing over most shortfalls with lunch at the Savoy. With the enormous potted azalea as an added zany extra. Jane Dunn.

Myself When Young was originally published with the title Growing Pains: The Shaping of a Writer. AW.

Jane Dunn
The Rendezvous and Other Stories

The party had been dull, tedious, and after all the man had never turned up. Only his daughter, a young unsophisticated girl, red elbows in evening dress. Not unattractive in profile but too young, much too young. Still, he had to make the most of his time. After all, her father was an important man...
He spoke to her early in the evening, and towards the end he was still by her side. 'Do you know, I swear I am not flattering you, but the moment I saw you I said to myself, "There is someone who will understand." It was something about your eyes, I think.'
The girl gazed at him flushing. 'Oh! but nobody has ever talked to me like this before. You see, being my father's daughter they expect me to echo his remarks, and they don't seem to imagine for an instant that I have a mind of my own... Of course, you simply must meet him,' she exclaimed. 'I'm quite sure you would get on famously together.'
'You dear thing, that's very sweet and adorable of you. But listen - tell me more about yourself.'
She held on to her evening bag with hot, sticky fingers. 'Oh! There's nothing, nothing.'
'Nonsense. Anyway, I feel we are going to be friends, real friends.' He held out his cigarette case and smiled. 'You don't smoke? How refreshing. One gets so tired of these women with their eternal cigarettes.'
The girl's eyes wandered towards the figure of her hostess, surrounded by a little group of men and women. 'She's lovely. Do you know her well?'
'Oh! one comes across her from time to time,' he answered carelessly. 'But luxury has never appealed to me, I like simple things, books, being alone, or with somebody who understands.'
'So do I.' They smiled at each other.
'I can talk to you about anything,' he said softly, 'not only books, but things that matter. It's marvellous to be able to discuss sex with a girl of your age, and not feel self-conscious, not be aware. You're so lovely too, which makes it all the more rare and astounding. You've been told so hundreds of times.'
'No - never -'
'But that is absolutely remarkable.' He moved closer, pressing her knee.
Then his hostess moved from her group towards them. He rose to his feet and made an excuse to the girl.
'For the last hour I've been driven nearly mad' he whispered rapidly. 'I haven't seen you for a moment alone... And I've been sitting here, chatting to this little schoolgirl, watching you. Gosh - you look wonderful – wonderful.'
The Rendezvous and Other Stories, The Lover, p182/4, Virago (2005).

If I'm choosing my real favourite du Maurier lines then it would have to be one of the many evocative descriptions of Cornwall, the magical destination for all our childhood holidays where we seemed to slip into a parallel world of barefoot life, smugglers' coves, high seas and hot porridge after our morning swim. But as a contrast I've chosen something utterly unromantic and uncomfortable, but remarkable just the same.
Every time I read this short story it gives me a kind of chill and I feel anxious for the girl (perhaps she reminds me of my young self) so naive and vulnerable - 'red elbows in evening dress' a quite brilliant and economical way of conjuring her presence. I particularly admire Daphne du Maurier for her fearless depiction of truly unlovable characters - in this story the nameless 'hero' is a heartless, lying cad, a false seducer of women. But his lovers, also nameless, are pathetic and greedy women conniving at their own betrayal. The author's contempt for them is palpable. Only the gauche girl at the party deserves sympathy and the reader's fear is that, initiated into life by these predatory adults, she can only become as cynical and corrupt as them. It's a chilling view of human relationships and enough to turn a sensitive soul to love of animals and houses instead! Jane Dunn.

Bob Tucker
The Flight of the Falcon

Someone was playing the piano... My lips framed a silent echo to the sound as it rose and fell, half gay, half sad, a timeless melody. Debussy. Yes, Debussy. The well-worn 'Arabesque,' but with a master touch. I stood beneath the wall and listened. The music ebbed and flowed, changed mood and entered the more solemn phrases, and then again that first light-hearted ripple, higher, ever higher, confident and gay, but at last with a descending scale, dissolving, vanishing. It seemed to say: All over, nevermore. The innocence of youth, the joy of childhood, leaping from bed to welcome a new day…all gone, the fervour spent. The repetition of the phrase was only a reminder, an echo of what had been. So swift to go, impossible to hold.
The Flight of the Falcon, Ch.5, p.56/7, Virago (2005).

I enjoy the way Daphne makes the scene come to life so vividly. You actually feel as if you are there as the narrator (Fabbio) and as if you can hear Signora Butali playing Debussy's Première Arabesque. To find such enchanting music in such an austere place, a walled city, makes the setting come alive more than usual in literature. I guess it reminds me of Proust's 'little phrase' in Remembrance of Things Past, which makes that music so real, something you can really get excited about. Daphne's book is one my father enjoyed and recommended before he passed away, which makes that book more special for me, even as my mother loved The Glass Blowers. I remember I had just finished reading The Flight of The Falcon and met a co-worker friend at a reception, who asked me if I'd read anything good lately? When I told him about Falcon he said he had just returned from a month's stay in Urbino and had much enjoyed his time there. Bob Tucker (US).

Debussy's Arabesque is a very light melody, dreamy and in the impressionistic mode of the time (Paris: 1888). There are many changes of mood, sometimes passionate, sometime gentle, exciting at times, calming at others. The tempo varies with different moods. It creates images of a sunny day in spring, a quiet walk in the park. Daphne learned the piece when being taught to play piano. Little wonder it was one of her favorites. Letters from Menabilly, Portrait of a Friendship, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, (1993), p168. CL.

Siobhan Isles
The King's General

It was thus, then, that I, Honor Harris of Lanrest, became a cripple, losing all power in my legs from that day forward until this day on which I write, so that for some twenty-five years now I have been upon my back, or upright in a chair, never walking any more, or feeling the ground beneath my feet. If anyone therefore thinks that a cripple makes an indifferent heroine to a tale, now is the time to close these pages and desist from reading.
The King's General, Ch.5, p.51, Virago (2004).

I love the challenge Honor throws down to the reader here. Her feisty wisdom pours from the lines, the paradox contained within is compelling - one MUST read on, the lines propel the narrative and the reader forward - irresistibly. Siobhan Isles.

Siobhan Isles
Frenchman's Creek

The yachtsman goes below to the snug security of his cabin, and browsing amongst his books he finds at last the thing for which he has been searching. It is a map of Cornwall, ill-drawn and inaccurate, picked up in an idle moment in a Truro bookshop. The parchment is faded and yellow, the markings indistinct. The spelling belongs to another century. Helford river is traced fairly enough, and so are the hamlets of Constantine and Gweek. But the yachtsman looks away from them to the marking of a narrow inlet, branching from the parent river, its short, twisting course running westward into a valley. Someone has scratched the name in thin faded letters - Frenchman's Creek.
The yachtsman puzzles awhile over the name, then shrugs his shoulders and rolls away the map. Presently he sleeps. The anchorage is still. No wind blows upon the water, and the night-jars are silent. The yachtsman dreams - and as the tide surges gently about his ship and the moon shines on the quiet river, soft murmurs come to him, and the past becomes the present.
A forgotten century peers out of dust and cobwebs and he walks in another time.
Frenchman's Creek, Ch.1, p.5, Virago (2003).

When I open my book of Frenchman's Creek, I always feel as though a delicate breeze has just ruffled my hair - as if, from the pages, Frenchman's Creek has stirred from its slumbers, just for a moment, before it disappears forever like a hazy childhood memory which I can't recapture or pin down, but is always there, somewhere, waiting for me to find it. I cajoled my family into hiring a boat, while we were at the 2009 Du Maurier Festival, so I could sail it into Frenchman's Creek. Upon reaching the top of the Creek, where the trees creep into the water, and the still pool at the end beckons, I had the same feeling I have every time I open the book - a feeling of stepping back, of trespassing into a century I'm not supposed to be in, just like the yachtsman above. To me, Daphne's evocation of the past bleeding into the present is the best I've ever read, and it sends a warm shiver up my spine every time. Siobhan Isles.