Sark honours Mervyn Peake with first blue plaque Published duration 30 August 2019

image caption Mervyn Peake lived in Sark for several years

Sark has unveiled its first blue plaque honouring writer, artist and poet Mervyn Peake.

Some of the writer's most critically acclaimed works were written on the Channel Island, including the first two novels in the Gormenghast series.

It was unveiled on Friday by Sark's Seigneur, the hereditary head of the island's parliament.

Mr Peake, who died in 1968, first went to Sark in 1932 as part of plans to set up an artist's colony.

The organisation, known as the Sark Group, created a modernist gallery where Mr Peake lived and worked.

image copyright Getty image caption Sark has no motor vehicles and a population of around 500

He returned with his family after the Second World War and lived on the island for four years.

It was during this period the first two instalments of the Gormenghast novels were published.

The island had a "very significant impact" on the writer's work, according to his eldest son Sebastian.

"Essentially, Sark was his home," he said in a 2018 Radio Four documentary