Barbara Trapido and Maggie O’Farrell on ‘Brother of the More Famous Jack’ – Zoom event

Join Barbara Trapido as she reads from and discusses the reissue of her cult-classic novel Brother of the More Famous Jack with Maggie O’Farrell, author of Hamnet and, most recently, Land. 

Barbara Trapido’s Brother of the More Famous Jack is a coming-of-age novel about a young woman, Katherine Browne, who finds herself quickly embedded in the gregarious, unruly, and thoroughly eccentric family of her academic mentor, Jacob Goldman. During her first visit to the Goldmans’ home, she falls in love with the eldest son, Roger, an affair that eventually collapses and sends a broken-hearted Katherine on an escape to Rome. But after ten years she returns to England—and soon discovers that her story with the Goldmans is nowhere close to finished. 

When first published in 1982, the TLS declared Trapido’s novel “A sort of Bohemian Brideshead Revisited” and has remained a cult favorite ever since, counting among its fans Rachel Cusk, Ann Patchett, Maria Semple, and more.

Register here for a discussion of the book and its afterlife.