Biography

Eric Fenby was born on April 22, 1906 in Scarborough, Yorkshire, England, UK. He was a writer and composer, known for Omnibus (1967), Jamaica Inn (1939) and NET Playhouse (1964). He was married to Rowena Marshall. He died on February 18, 1997 in Scarborough, Yorkshire, England, UK.

He was a good friend of fellow English composer Frederick Delius. He served as the latter's amanuensis from 1928 to 1934, a work for which he'll later become very famous for.

He was portrayed by Christopher Gable in Ken Russell's famous TV movie about Frederick Delius, "A Song Of Summer", and served on that film as technical adviser and Russell's collaborator on the script.

Fenby was a convert to Roman Catholicism, and devoutly religious. As a result, he was often, to his great distress, in severe conflict with the fiercely anti-religious Delius. After Delius's death, Fenby suffered a prolonged nervous breakdown; for some of the time, he had a psychosomatic inability to walk. According to Ken Russell, he had a further breakdown after working on Russell's TV movie about Delius in 1968 - this had the side-effect of making him break out in painful sores all over his body.