Gormenghast (series) between pride in his lineage and the desire to escape from the castle and its traditions. Titus is born at the beginning of the first book of the series, the son of Sepulchrave and Gertrude, and is an infant throughout the whole of "Titus Groan". He grows up and reaches young adulthood in the second book Gormenghast, which ends with him leaving Gormenghast after defeating Steerpike in battle. In the third book Titus Alone Titus discovers a world outside of Gormenghast where the castle and its inhabitants are unknown. Titus also features in another book called Boy in Darkness which
Gormenghast (castle) inner buildings of Gormenghast owe much to the Gothic and Regency period mansions and to the various styles of English country house. The quadrangles and professors' quarters also owe something to the architecture of Oxford and Cambridge and to Eltham College where Peake was educated as a boy when he returned to England. Finally, the isolated Channel island of Sark, which retained a feudal system of government until 2008, may have influenced Peake, who lived there in the early 1930s and again in the late 1940s. The references to Gormenghast castle as a rocky island of many promontories and sheer