Terence Davies

Terence Davies (10 November 1945 – 7 October 2023) was an influential British screenwriter, film director, and novelist. Known for his autobiographical films like Distant Voices, Still Lives (1988), The Long Day Closes (1992) and Of Time and the City (2008), and literary adaptations like The Neon Bible (1995), The House of Mirth (2000), The Deep Blue Sea (2011) and Sunset Song (2015), he extensively covered the entirety of the 20th century Britain in his works. Davies was the youngest of ten siblings, raised by deeply religious Catholic parents and after his father's death when he was just seven years old, he recalls the following four years as the happiest of his life. After working in a shipping office and as an unqualified accountant for a decade, he left for Coventry Drama School in 1971.

Davies first introduced his alter ego, Robert Tucker, in his debut autobiographical short, Children (1976) and continued to explore his life in Madonna and Child (1980) and Death and Transfiguration (1983). His examination of working-class life in Liverpool through Distant Voices, Still Lives and The Long Day Closes cemented him as a prominent figure in English cinema. Davies, who was openly gay, portrayed gay themes alongside post-war Liverpool experiences in his works. Facing financing issues, he experienced a long hiatus before returning with the documentary Of Time and the City, an ode to Liverpool. In his later career, Davies focused on influential literary figures, with his final works being A Quiet Passion (2016), based on the life of Emily Dickinson, and Benediction (2021), about Siegfried Sassoon. Davies remained active in the film industry until his death in 2023.