Arthur Quiller Couch

Arthur Quiller Couch “Q” 1863 – 1944

Q was born at Bodmin in Cornwall to the union of two ancient local families, the Quiller family and the Couch family and was the third in line of intellectuals from the Couch family. Like the du Mauriers, Q was surrounded by writers and linguists. His younger sisters Florence Mabel and Lilian M. were also writers and folklorists (The Age). His father, Dr. Thomas Quiller Couch (d. 1884), was a noted physician, folklorist and historian. His grandfather, Jonathan Couch, was an eminent naturalist, also a physician, historian, classicist, apothecary, and illustrator (particularly of fishes) in the style of the time. His son, Bevil Brian Quiller-Couch, was a war hero and poet, whose romantic letters to his fiancée, the poet May Wedderburn Cannan, were published in the beautiful but tragic Tears of War. He also had a daughter, Foy Felicia, to whom Kenneth Grahame inscribed a first edition of his The Wind in the Willows attributing Quiller-Couch as the inspiration for the character Ratty.

On taking his degree in 1886 he was for a short time classical lecturer at Trinity. After some journalistic experience in London, mainly as a contributor to the Speaker, in 1891 he settled at Fowey in Cornwall.

Quiller-Couch was made a Bard of Gorseth Kernow in 1928, taking the Bardic name Marghak Cough ('Red Knight'). He was Commodore of the Royal Fowey Yacht Club from 1911 until his death. Anyone visiting Fowey would see the lanes and streams jumping off the pages as they looked around them.  Not all of his works are set in Fowey by any means and his work on folklore and language are equally fascinating.

Novels:

1887: Dead Man’s Rock
1888: The Astonishing History of Troy Town
1889: The Splendid Spur
1891: The Blue Pavilions
1898: St. Ives by R.L Stevenson: completed by Q. 
1899: The Ship of Stars
1902: The Westcotes
1903: The Adventures of Harry Revel
1903: Hetty Wesley
1904: Fort Amity
1905: The Shining Ferry
1906: Sir John Constantine
1906: The Mayor of Troy
1907: Poison Island
1907: Major Vigoureux
1909: True Tilda
1910: Lady Good-for-Nothing
1911: Brother Copas
1912: Hocken and Hunken
1915: Nicky-Nan, Reservist
1918: Foe Farrell

Part 1 & drafts of Castle Dor prepared by Q
1962 completed by Daphne du Maurier

Short Story Collections:

1891: Noughts and Crosses
1892: I SawThree Ships, and Other Winter’s Tales.
1893: The Delectable Duchy
1895: Wandering Heath
1900: Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts
1901: The Laird’s Luck
1902: The White Wolf
1903: Two Sides of the Face
1905: Shakespeare’s Christmas
1907: The Merry Garden
1910: Corporal Sam and Other Stories
1913: News from the Duchy
1917: Mortallone and Aunt Trinidad, Tales of the Spanish Main
1937: Mystery Stories