George Louis Palmella Busson Du Maurier

George Louis Palmella Busson Du Maurier , 1834-96, English artist and novelist, b. Paris of a French father and an English mother. He studied chemistry, but later turned to art for a livelihood. In spite of the loss of one eye when he was a young man, he became a successful illustrator and in 1864 joined the staff of Punch. His novels include Peter Ibbetson (1892), successfully dramatized in 1915 and later made into an opera by Deems Taylor (1931) and Trilby (1894), the story of a young model who becomes a great singer when hypnotized by the musician Svengali.

Bibliography: See biography by L. Ormond (1969).

Daphne Du Maurier, 1907-89, his granddaughter, was the author of popular novels, including Jamaica Inn (1936) and Rebecca (1938); The Rendezvous and Other Stories (1980); and two memoirs, Gerald: A Portrait (1934), about her actor father, and The Du Mauriers (1937).

du Maurier, George Louis Palmella Busson (1834–96), artist and writer. He contributed to Punch and other periodicals, and illustrated editions of Mrs Gaskell, Meredith, Hardy, and H. James. He wrote humorous verse, including ‘The History of the Jack Sprats’, and a parody of W. Morris's ballads, ‘The Legend of Camelot’, with mock Pre-Raphaelite illustrations. In 1891 he published his first novel, Peter Ibbetson, and in 1894, Trilby, for which he is still remembered. The Martian, a story based on school life, appeared posthumously in 1897.