Du Maurier, Daphne (1907–1989)

The Helford river estuary is the site of Frenchman's Creek, made famous by the novelist Daphne du Maurier (1907–1989) in her 1942 novel of that name. Although born in London and educated in Paris, she settled and spent most of her adult life in Cornwall, where the majority of her books are also set.

English novelist. Her romantic fiction includes Jamaica Inn (1936), Rebecca (1938), Frenchman's Creek (1942), and My Cousin Rachel (1951), and is set in Cornwall. Her work, though lacking in depth and original insights, is made compelling by her storytelling gift.

Jamaica Inn, Rebecca, and her short story The Birds were made into films by the English director Alfred Hitchcock. She was made a Dame of the British Empire in 1969.

She was the granddaughter of British cartoonist and novelist George Du Maurier. She wrote a biography of her father, the actor-manager Gerald Du Maurier, in Gerald (1934), and a record of three generations in The Du Mauriers (1937). Other novels include The Loving Spirit (1931), The Parasites (1949), The Glassblowers (1963), The Flight of the Falcon (1965), Rule Britannia (1972), and The Winding Stair (1976). She also published many short stories, some collected in The Breaking Point (1959), Not after Midnight (1971), and The Rendezvous and Other Stories (1980). She also wrote three plays and the non-fiction work The Infernal World of Branwell Brontë (1960).