Margaret ('Margo') Isabel Mabel Durrell (1920-2007) was the younger sister of novelist Lawrence Durrell, and elder sister of naturalist, author and TV presenter Gerald Durrell, whose Corfu Trilogy of novels — My Family and Other Animals, Birds, Beasts and Relatives and Garden of the Gods — lampoons her character variously.
Born in British India, she was brought up in India, England and Corfu. In 1935, Margo went with her mother, Gerald and Leslie to live on Corfu, following after her eldest brother Lawrence, who had moved there with his first wife, Nancy Myers. By 1939, when her mother returned to England with Gerald and Leslie following the outbreak of World War II, Margo decided her real home was on Corfu and returned. She shared a peasant cottage with some local friends. In 1939, she met a British Royal Air Force pilot, Jack Breeze, stationed on Corfu. He convinced her of the dangers of staying on Corfu, and left with her to South Africa; the pair married in 1940. Margo lived with Breeze in South Africa for the remainder of the war. When the war ended, Margo and her husband moved to Bournemouth. Margo and Jack Breeze had two children, Gerry (named after Gerald Durrell) and Nicholas.
After divorcing her first husband, Margo purchased a large house across the street from her mother's house in Bournemouth, and after refurbishing it, she opened a boarding house there. Gerald Durrell's core collection for his zoo (now the Jersey Zoo) was initially housed on the premises of her boarding house. Margo eventually remarried, her new husband's name being Malcolm Duncan.
Margo considered herself Greek, and worked for a while on a Greek cruise ship.[1]
Margaret Durrell was the author of Whatever Happened to Margo?, a reprise on her pet name used in the Corfu Trilogy. The book is the tale of Margo's adventures as a Bournemouth landlady in the late 1940s. Written in a humorous style, it includes references to the rest of the Durrell family, particularly Leslie, Gerald and Louisa Durrell. Apparently written in the 1960s, it was discovered in the attic by a granddaughter nearly 40 years later and published in 1995.[2]
Margaret died aged 87 on 16 January, 2007.[3]
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