Corfu Trilogy

Last summer, on a particularly hum-drum Sunday evening, I stumbled upon “The Durrells in Corfu,” a high-quality multi-part British mini-series, on PBS. After one episode, I was irretrievably hooked and made it a point thereafter to show up for each new Sunday evening installment.I just finished reading the book upon which this series was based and found it to be every bit as charming and enchanting, humorous and light-hearted, as the mini-series. The book is actually three books in one (don’t know if the three books correspond chronologically to the three parts of the mini-series), with the apt titles of “My Family and Other Animals;” “Birds, Beasts and Relatives;” and “The Garden of the Gods.”The story is based on the real-life exploits of Gerry Durrell, a young boy who went on to become a respected naturalist. His youthful adventures on the Greek island of Corfu would be any young boy’s dream come true.Our story opens in England in the late 1930s. Louisa Durrell is widowed with four children ranging in age from the early 20s down to Gerry, a boy of around ten years old, who is the star of this show. The Durrells are down on their luck. Without a man around the house they are having trouble making ends meet, and the bleak dreary weather in their homeland is starting to weigh on them. The oldest child, Larry, has in the past visited a friend on the island of Corfu and has a brainstorm that that would be a good place for the family to relocate. And so they do.Before you know it, they have moved into a run-down villa near the scintillating sea of this Greek paradise.What follows is a series of adventures and run-ins with some of the most colorful and memorable characters ever to have trod on the written page.The mother, Louisa - loving, welcoming, permissive and lenient to a fault with her family brood - is a bit of an airhead, but without question the most likeable of airheads. Larry, a budding novelist, is a bit insufferable and hyperbolic with a superior attitude and a sharp tongue. Leslie, the next younger son, is obsessed with guns and hunting. Margo, struggling with both baby-fat and acne, is nevertheless love obsessed; she is also prone to the most hilarious malapropisms.And then there is young Gerry. Gerry is filled with curiosity and zest for the natural world and to him Corfu is a seeming Garden of Eden. Every day he rises bright and early and with his loyal canine companion, Roger, sets out on one adventure after another, usually coming back to the family homestead with some strange creature (animal, bird or insect) to add to his ever-growing menagerie. (The denizens of this menagerie sometimes become integral parts of the story. There is one prolonged passage describing a night-time battle witnessed up-close by Gerry between a gecko and a praying mantis, which takes place in his bedroom, and which goes on for pages; the description is so minutely detailed that the reader will be mesmerized.)Then there are the members of the family’s inner circle: Lugaretzia, the hypochondriac maid; Spiro, the family “fixer,” as it were, a veritable conjurer capable of procuring anything that the family desires; Theodore, the gentle-natured intellectual answer man; and Kralefsky, Gerry’s tutor and always ill-fated “ladies man.”It seems that the Durrell household is an open house for all sorts of family friends who come to visit, as well as some of the more eccentric locals. There is Captain Creech, a crusty old irrepressible sea-captain who perhaps has the best lines in the book and is always making the widow Durrell blush with this off-color remarks and suggestive repartee. There is also a furloughed convict whom Gerry meets while out fishing, who has a sad tale to tell and who sees Gerry almost as a surrogate son. Then there is the unendurable Frenchman, a friend of Larry’s, who has his comeuppance in an ignominious turn while out in Gerry’s dingy (named the Bootle-Bumtrinket).If I had to describe this book in a nutshell, I would say it is a cross between Robinson Crusoe and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. In my opinion this book should be required reading for any impressionable and imaginative young person. (It also serves as a valuable vocabulary lesson inasmuch as it is superbly written simply from a linguistic point of view.)Even at close to 800 pages long, I was sad to have this book come to an end. I am going to miss each and every one of these colorful characters. I am glad to have made their acquaintance in the pages of this delightful book.

Gerald Durrell is one of my very favorite writers. His writing is amazing--rhythm, content, laugh-out-louds. I read the whole three-part series but in separate editions. I highly recommend his writing and his work with helping animals. He also creates such an amazing picture in this reader's mind of the island of Corfu and its people, and I love it when I can laugh out loud at a book as well as underline loved passages (which I found throughout)! I am glad PBS put on The Durrell series. Otherwise many of Durrell's books might have gone out-of-print, which would have been a great loss to the reading public!😀

I read "My Family and Other Animals" as a kid and loved it, so I decided to read the whole Corfu trilogy. It's very enjoyable, beautiful descriptions of the scenery and the creatures Gerry found, with many humorous anecdotes about his family and visitors. However, if you cannot overlook racist language (of course everyone should be offended by it), you won't enjoy this. Not that it comes up very often, but this author grew up in colonial India and Corfu in the 1920s and '30s, and his writing shows the attitudes of the time. In historical context, most of it is an enjoyable read.

Wonderful trilogy, great for all ages! The life the Durrells led in Corfu was magical & Gerald’s memories of his childhood there are so well relived in his novels. Gerald Durrell was an innovator and lead a full life devoted to animal conservation. His legacy continues today throughout the world.These are the stories that the wonderful show The Durrells in Corfu were based on (although the show expanded on Gerald’s writings & semi-fictionalized certain elements - but the show is no less wonderful). The 2005 movie “My Family and Other Animals” starring Imelda Staunton is completely based on this trilogy and worth watching as well.

There was NOTHING I did not LOVE in the Corfu Trilogy, an actual recounting by the youngest Durell family member, Gerald, on his family's life in Corfu, for five amazing, eventful and adventurous years. Tired of the stint of depressing wet weather, in Great Britain, the elder son, Lawrence, convinces his family to move to Greece, following the death of his father, so that he can pursue his dream of becoming a writer. Arriving in Corfu, the family is befriended by a Greek local, a taxi driver, who takes them under his wing, and becomes a family fixture. This beautifully written and hilarious true accounting will keep you laughing, engaged and mesmerized. Both Lawrence Durell AND Gerald Durell went on to become accomplished, famous and prolific writers! I couldn't put this book down! Am looking forward to reading the additional titles by these two! Do yourself a favor and pick up this great read, especially with summer now fast approaching. You'll be glad you did! In addition, PBS has turned this into a fabulous series!