Reading Group Notes on the Works of Daphne du Maurier by Dr Serena Trowbridge
Dr Serena Trowbridge
Many of you will be familiar with the name Serena Trowbridge. She is hugely supportive of the Daphne du Maurier website and has become an important, regular contributor at the du Maurier Fowey Literary Festival, where she has, for some years, presented some superb talks on a range of subjects from Reading and Re-Reading Daphne du Maurier: how books change us to Frankenstein and its Legacies. She also hosts reading groups during each festival, focusing on Daphne du Maurier's books. This year, she chose the short story collection, Don't Look Now and Other Stories.
Serena is Reader in Victorian Literature at the School of English, Birmingham City University. She teaches a module on Gothic Literature to her final-year students. In the module, they consider novels spanning several centuries, all within the Gothic genre, including The Monk by Matthew Lewis (1796), Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontė (1847), Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (1938), and The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters (2009).
The article that Serena produced as a result of her talk Reading and Re-Reading Daphne du Maurier: how books change us, is available to read in our website's Interesting Facts section here: https://www.dumaurier.org/menu_page.php?id=199. Over the past few years, Serena has also encouraged her students with the best grades in the Gothic module to contribute their Rebecca related papers to our website. You will also find those in the Interesting Facts section. If you search for the word 'Gothic' on the index page here: https://www.dumaurier.org/interestingfacts.php, you will find links to all the students' contributions.
Serena has very generously offered us her Reading Group notes to share with you all. To date, she has led five reading groups: The Loving Spirit, Frenchman's Creek, The King's General, Castle Dor, and Don't Look Now and Other Stories. Please click on the following links to read her notes and possibly incorporate them into your own reading Group sessions.
For reading group notes on
The Loving Spirit (1931) click here: https://www.dumaurier.org/data/uploads/2201_1537776301.pdf
Frenchman's Creek (1941) click here: https://www.dumaurier.org/data/uploads/2202_1418227009.pdf
The King's General (1946) click here: https://www.dumaurier.org/data/uploads/2203_1572066701.pdf
Castle Dor (1962) click here: https://www.dumaurier.org/data/uploads/2205_688959906.pdf
Don't Look Now and Other Stories (1973)
click here: https://www.dumaurier.org/data/uploads/2204_274778170.pdf