Get the latest entertainment news, reviews and star-studded interviews with our Independent Culture email
Get the latest entertainment news with our free Culture newsletter
Get the latest entertainment news with our free Culture newsletter
Dame Jilly Cooper, the celebrated author of novels such as Riders and Rivals, died from a fatal head injury sustained during a fall at her Gloucestershire home, an inquest has heard.
Family members found the writer at her Bisley home around 5pm on 4 October.
Initially alert, she was transferred to Gloucestershire Royal Hospital, but her condition deteriorated. She died in hospital, with family present, at 8:30am on 5 October.
Gloucestershire Coroners’ Court heard Senior Coroner Katy Skerrett concluded the death was accidental, caused by a traumatic subdural haematoma.
open image in gallery
Dame Jilly Cooper pictured at Windsor Castle in 2024 (PA)
Cooper is one of the UK’s most celebrated authors, best known for her steamy fiction focusing on scandal and adultery in upper-class society. She wrote Rivals in 1988, the second book in her Rutshire Chronicles series, which depicts the sordid ongoings in a power struggle between two television companies in the Cotswolds.
Rivals was turned into a hit show for Disney+ in 2024, starring the likes of Danny Dyer, David Tennant, Katherine Parkinson, Alex Hassell, Aidan Turner and Emily Atack.
Following Cooper’s death, showrunner Dominic Treadwell-Collins and fellow Rivals producer Alex Lamb said: “We are broken-hearted. Jilly was and always will be one of the world’s greatest storytellers, and it has been the most incredible honour to have been able to work with her to adapt her incredible novels for television.
“Crawling around on her sitting room floor with storylines on pieces of paper, sitting up late at her kitchen table holding hands with love and our tummies with laughter, receiving scoldings and heaps of wisdom in equal measure, watching her eyes sparkling as she sat behind the monitor on set watching Rutshire brought to life – every moment spent with Jilly Cooper was bloody marvellous.
“We have been so lucky to be able to call her our friend – and know that her legacy will endure in her writing, her television and the encouragement to have fun that she gave us all.”
open image in gallery
From left, Rivals cast Aidan Turner, Katherine Parkinson, Emily Atack, David Tennant, Jilly Cooper, Danny Dyer, Alex Hassell, Nafessa Williams, Bella Maclean, Claire Rushbrook and Victoria Smurfit attending the UK special screening of the first series (Lucy North/PA) (PA Archive)
Cooper’s children, Felix and Emily said: “Mum was the shining light in all of our lives.
“Her love for all of her family and friends knew no bounds. Her unexpected death has come as a complete shock.
“We are so proud of everything she achieved in her life and can’t begin to imagine life without her infectious smile and laughter all around us.”
The Queen has also paid tribute to the author, describing her as a “legend” and a “wonderfully witty and compassionate friend to me and so many”.
