Stella Gibbons experience of school, Gibbons found university exhilarating and made numerous friendships, particularly with Ida Graves, an aspiring poet who, although on a different course, attended some of the same lectures. The two shared a love of literature and a taste for subversive humour. Graves lived until 1999, and recalled in an interview late in life that many of the jokes they shared found their way into "Cold Comfort Farm", as did some of their common acquaintances. Soon after Gibbons began the course she contributed a poem, "The Marshes of My Soul", to the December 1921 issue of "University College Magazine".
Stella Gibbons quickly forgave him. He left the theatre in 1949 to become a director of a book club specialising in special editions, and later bought a bookshop in the Archway district of London. His health failed in the late 1950s and in 1958 he was diagnosed with cancer of the liver. He died in July 1959 at Oakshott Avenue. After Webb's death, Gibbons remained at Oakshott Avenue and continued to write novels. From 1961 she rented a summer house at Trevone in Cornwall, which became the setting for her 1962 novel "The Weather at Tregulla". She returned to literary criticism after