Margaret Durrell

{{Short description|British memoirist (1919-2007)}} {{Use British English|date=December 2012}} {{Use dmy dates|date=February 2023}}

{{Infobox person | name = Margo Durrell | image = Photo of Margaret Durrell.jpg | caption = | birth_name = Margaret Isabel Mabel Durrell | birth_date = 4 May 1919 | birth_place = Kurseong, Bengal, British India | death_date = {{dda|2007|1|16|1919|5|4|df=y}} | death_place = Bournemouth, Dorset, England | nationality = | other_names = | occupation = | years_active = | known_for = | notable_works = ''Whatever Happened to Margo?'' | children = 2 | parents = {{Plainlist| * Lawrence Samuel Durrell * Louisa Durrell}} | relatives = {{Plainlist| * Lawrence Durrell (brother) * Gerald Durrell (brother) * Leslie Durrell (brother) }} | spouse = {{Plainlist| * {{marriage|Jack Breeze|1940||end=div}} * {{marriage|Malcolm "Mac" Duncan||end=div}} }} | family = Durrell }} '''Margaret Isabel Mabel "Margo" Durrell''' (4 May 1919 – 16 January 2007) was the younger sister of novelist Lawrence Durrell and elder sister of naturalist, author, and TV presenter Gerald Durrell, who lampoons her character in his Corfu trilogy of novels: ''My Family and Other Animals'', ''Birds, Beasts, and Relatives'', and ''The Garden of the Gods''.

She wrote a memoir, ''Whatever Happened to Margo?'', giving a humorous account of her experiences as a Bournemouth landlady in the late 1940s. It includes details about the lives of her family, particularly Leslie, Gerald, and her mother Louisa Durrell following their time on Corfu. The manuscript was apparently written in the 1960s and was discovered in the attic by a granddaughter nearly 35 years later. It was published in 1995.<ref>Robin Balke, [http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_19961013/ai_n14085970 Paperback reviews], The Independent, 13 October 1996</ref>

==Early life== Durrell was born in Kurseong, Bengal,<ref name=Haag2017>{{Cite book |title=The Durrells of Corfu |last=Haag |first=Michael |year=2017 |location=London |publisher=Profile Books |isbn=978-1782832294}}</ref> in British India and brought up in India and England. In 1935, along with her brothers Gerald and Leslie, she accompanied her mother to a new home on Corfu, following her eldest brother, Lawrence, who had moved there a few months earlier with his first wife, Nancy Myers. Margo's mother, with Gerald and Leslie, returned to England by 1939 with the outbreak of World War II, but Margo decided that her real home was on Corfu and remained on the island, sharing a peasant cottage with some local friends.

==Marriages and wartime== Durrell met Jack Breeze, the chief flight engineer of an Imperial Airways flying boat, later the same year.<ref name=Haag2017 /> At the time, Imperial Airways used Corfu as a waypoint between Africa and England.<ref name=Haag2017 /> He convinced her of the dangers of staying on Corfu, so, after Christmas, she left on one of the last Imperial Airways flights to leave the island to rejoin her family in Bournemouth.<ref name=Haag2017 />

She married Breeze in early 1940, and they moved to South Africa when the airline posted him there later in the year.<ref name=Haag2017 /> During the war years, they eventually moved to Mozambique and then Ethiopia, where she gave birth to their first child, Gerry, in an Italian prisoner-of-war camp by Caesarean section without anesthetic.<ref name=Haag2017 /> They lived in Cairo towards the end of the war.<ref name=Haag2017 /> After the war ended, they moved back to Bournemouth, where they had their second son, Nicholas.<ref name=Haag2017 />

==Boarding house and zoo== Durrell divorced her husband and, in 1947, purchased a large property across the street from her mother's house in Bournemouth, turning it into a boarding house.<ref name=Haag2017 /> Gerald Durrell's core collection for his zoo was initially housed in the back garden and garage. Later, Margo had a short-lived marriage with musician Malcolm "Mac" Duncan. She was still enamoured with Greece, so she applied for a job on a Greek cruise ship travelling to the Caribbean that she saw advertised in a newspaper.<ref>Margaret Durrell Remembers, in ''Lawrence Durrell and the Greek World'', edited by Anna Lilios</ref>

==Death== Margaret Durrell died at age 87 on 16 January 2007.<ref name="Jersey Evening Post">{{cite news|title=Durrell death marks the end of an era|url=http://jerseyeveningpost.com/news/2007/02/01/durrell-death-marks-the-end-of-an-era/|accessdate=15 May 2017|work=Jersey Evening Post|date=1 February 2007}}</ref> Her ashes were scattered on Pontikonisi, an islet off Corfu, to which the Durrells used to swim as children; part of the ashes of her brother Gerald had also been scattered there following his death in 1995.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Shute |first=Joe |date=12 March 2021 |title=My Fight to Save an Idyllic Corfu Paradise from Developers |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/lee-durrells-fight-save-geralds-corfu-paradise/ |url-access=subscription |archive-url=https://archive.today/20210318102910/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/lee-durrells-fight-save-geralds-corfu-paradise/#selection-1376.0-1376.1 |archive-date=18 March 2021 |work=The Telegraph}}</ref>

== Bibliography == * ''Whatever Happened to Margo?'' (1996, {{ISBN|0-233-98917-X}})

== Portrayals == * In the BBC 10-part TV series ''My Family and Other Animals'' (1987), Margo was played by Sarah-Jane Holm. * In the film ''My Family and Other Animals'' (2005), Margo was played by Tamzin Merchant. * In the ITV 4-season TV series ''The Durrells'' (2016–2019), Margo was played by Daisy Waterstone.

==References== {{reflist}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Durrell, Margaret}} Category:1920 births Category:2007 deaths Category:20th-century English memoirists Category:20th-century English women writers Category:21st-century English writers Category:21st-century English women Margaret Category:People from Darjeeling district Category:British people in British India Category:English expatriates in Greece Category:British women in World War II