English author, Barbara Taylor Bradford, known for best-selling novels including ‘A Woman of Substance’, has died at the age of 91.
A statement from Taylor Bradford’s representative on Monday said she “died peacefully at her home yesterday following a short illness, and was surrounded by loved ones to the very end.”
Paying tribute, her publisher and editor Lynne Drew said, “Dominating the bestseller lists, she broke new ground with her sweeping epic novels spanning generations, novels which were resolutely not romances, and she epitomised the woman of substance she created, particularly with her ruthless work ethic.”
The author was “perennially curious, interested in everyone and extraordinarily driven”, Drew said, and was “an inspiration for millions of readers and countless writers.”
Chief executive of publisher HarperCollins, Charlie Redmayne, said, “Barbara Taylor Bradford was a truly exceptional writer whose first book, the international bestseller A Woman of Substance, changed the lives of so many who read it – and still does to this day.”
She was “a natural storyteller” as well as “a great, great friend,” he added.
Let’s get to know more about the legendary author!
Who is Barbara Taylor Bradford?
Taylor Bradford was born in May 1933.
She grew up in Leeds and attended the same nursery school as Alan Bennett.
Her mother, having lost a son to meningitis before Taylor’s birth, channeled “all her frustrated love” into her, as Taylor Bradford shared with the Guardian in 2013.
She provided her daughter with a rich cultural upbringing, taking her to the cinema weekly and to the Russian ballet whenever it visited Leeds.
The writer later fictionalized her parents’ marriage in her 1986 novel, An Act of Will.
At 28, she met her husband, American film producer Robert Bradford, known as Bob, at a cocktail party, and they married on Christmas Eve 1963, after which she relocated to the US to join him.
Taylor Bradford and Bob did not have children, a situation she stated was never a significant source of sadness for her. Bob passed away after suffering a stroke in 2019.
Bradford’s career
Taylor Bradford started her career as a typist for the Yorkshire Evening Post and was later promoted to reporter.
She became the paper’s first women’s editor before moving to London at 20, where she worked for Woman’s Own and the London Evening News. An interior design column she wrote was syndicated to 183 newspapers.
She then began writing the sagas she is famous for; her debut novel, A Woman of Substance, was published in 1979 and has sold over 30 million copies worldwide.
This was followed by six sequels in the Emma Harte saga, with a long-awaited prequel, A Man of Honour, published in 2021.
Ten of her books were adapted for screen by her husband, featuring actors like Liam Neeson, Sir Anthony Hopkins, and Elizabeth Hurley.
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