Rumer Godden in conversation with Jenny Brown

The task of highlighting some of the writings and films of British author Rumer Godden was part of SACF’s Heritage Project Indo- British Collaboration in Cinema (1930-1951).

SACF’s A Hidden Heritage project will unravel the life and works of Rumer Godden in literature and cinema.

Margaret Rumer Godden (10 December 1907 – 8 November 1998) was a British novelist and writer, born in Eastbourne, Sussex. She started writing from the age of 5 and kept writing till the end of her life. Her father worked for Navigation Company in British India where a large part of her childhood was spent.

Many of her books were turned into films. Some of them were: ‘A Fugue in Time’ or “Take Three Tenses’ that was made into the MGM film Enchantment (1948), starring David Niven and Teresa Wright and ‘The Greengage Summer’ 1958 made in 1961. But, the film adaptation she liked best was Jean Renoir’s film The River (1951) inspired by her autobiographical novel about her own childhood in India written in 1946.