Cherry Large on how her late daughter is being remembered through the arts

How can the End be the Beginning again when all Seems lost? This Haiku was written by our young daughter while at school. Over the next few years of her life she came back to this writing of hers, it must have helped her in her progress through what turned out to be a short life.

She died aged 19 in a car accident, an inexperienced driver on a muddy, greasy road. Can you imagine the shock and desolation when a policeman knocks on the door with the devastating news that your daughter is dead?

But in the days immediately after this my husband and I decided to found a charity to help young singers and actors, talented as Sophie had been, who were struggling to make ends meet while in training.

Once this was known the donations came pouring in and Sophie’s Silver Lining Fund was on track to achieve what it had set out to do.

Dame Judi Dench agreed to be our patron. We published a book of Sophie’s writing, a collection from a very early age until the very day she died, called Sophie’s Log. This sold thousands of copies and boosted the funds of our charity significantly.

A year or two later, in the spirit of Sophie herself, we set out to commission a play based on Sophie’s Log to take to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

The playwright, to whom we were introduced by an American acting student at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and whom we were supporting, was one Bryan Willis, from Seattle.

He created a wonderful little play, cleverly crafted to bring in much of Sophie’s own writing, and the cast consisted of Sophie as a young girl and Sophie on the day she died. It was thrilling when the BBC recognised its worth and broadcast it on Radio 4, as the afternoon play.

Bryan will be returning on Saturday, March 21, with a group of young drama students from the University of Western Washington, near Seattle, on what they call their now annual ‘BritTour’ to stay with us in Chacombe, near Banbury. They are the seventh group to have come, and they perform six or so short plays (five to 10 minutes long) back-to-back in our own little theatre, Sophie’s Barn. The plays have been written by playwrights from the north-west of the USA.

Bryan has become one of our closest friends. Indeed, many of the kind people we have met through setting up our charity, most of whom never met Sophie, are now very dear to us.

Read the Haiku again. We now know all was not lost. Our charity flourishes 17 years on.

The performance is at 7.30pm, in Sophie’s Barn, 17 Silver Street, Chacombe, near Banbury, OX17 2JR. No tickets are sold but please tell Cherry you want to come in advance. Thelarges@aol.com. There will be a collection for Sophie’s Silver Lining Fund.