Gormenghast (novel) by the Carvers and lives a feral life in the forests around Gormenghast. Titus first meets her when he escapes from the confines of Gormenghast into the outside world. Titus is entranced by her wild grace, and sets out to meet her. He does so, and holds her briefly, but she flees him and is fatally struck by lightning. However, her fierce independence inspires Titus, and gives him courage to later leave his home. Due to the vigilance of the old servant Flay Steerpike is eventually unmasked as the murderer of the aunts of Titus, Cora and Clarice. He becomes
Gormenghast (castle) to school. Occupied by the same family for five hundred years, Knole's sprawling layout and varied architecture, added to and modified by successive generations, bear comparison with Gormenghast. (Some of the descriptions of Knole by Vita Sackville-West are also remarkably similar to passages by Peake.) Its massive walls evoke the great Norman castles and keeps of medieval Europe, such as the walled city of Carcassonne (pictured), Rochester Castle in England or Caernarfon Castle in Wales; while the ancient walled Chinese cities of Beijing and Tientsin where Mervyn Peake spent his childhood are a major influence. Another Chinese source may be