Other influences on Durrell during his formative years were the works of naturalists Charles Darwin, Alfred Russel Wallace, Jean-Henri Fabre and Gilbert White. She stated that both families had hoped that she and Durrell would marry one day, but any such prospect was disrupted by the outbreak of war in 1939. Stephanides' daughter Alexia Mercouri (1927–2018) accompanied the two on their field trips. Together, they examined Corfu's fauna, which Durrell housed in a variety of items including test tubes and bathtubs. He became Durrell's greatest friend and mentor, his ideas leaving a lasting impression on the young naturalist. Theodore Stephanides was a Greek-British doctor, scientist, poet, translator, and a friend of George Wilkinson, one of Durrell's tutors. Durrell was home-schooled during this time by various private tutors, mostly friends of his brother Lawrence. The Corfu years also set the background for two TV series and one telefilm. The family lived on Corfu until 1939, and this interval became the basis of Durrell's books My Family and Other Animals Birds, Beasts, and Relatives and The Garden of the Gods plus a few short stories such as "My Donkey Sally". On Corfu Durrell began to collect and keep the local fauna as pets. Louisa moved to the Greek island of Corfu in 1935 with Leslie, Margaret, and Gerald, joining her eldest son Lawrence who had arrived there with his wife Nancy about a week earlier. Durrell was enrolled in Wickwood School, but frequently stayed at home, feigning illness. The family moved to Britain shortly before the death of his father in 1928 and settled in the Upper Norwood, Crystal Palace, area of South London. Durrell reportedly recalled his first visit to a zoo in India and attributed his lifelong love of animals to that encounter. Durrell's father was a British engineer and, as was commonplace for a family of their status, the infant Durrell spent most of his time in the company of an ayah (nursemaid). He was the fifth and youngest child (an elder sister having died in infancy) of Louisa Florence Dixie and Lawrence Samuel Durrell, both of whom were born in India of English and Irish descent. Durrell was born in Jamshedpur, British India, on 7 January 1925.
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