BARBARA TAYLOR BRADFORD OBE TO BECOME PATRON OF THE LEEDS LIBRARY

The Leeds Library, the oldest membership subscription library in the country, has today (4 November 2021) announced that the international bestselling author Barbara Taylor Bradford OBE has accepted an invitation to become a patron of the Library.

Barbara Taylor Bradford OBE was born in Upper Armley in Leeds and began her career as a journalist for the Yorkshire Evening Post. She then moved to London to work on Fleet Street and continued on to America to pursue her writing career. An author of 38 novels, all of which have been international bestsellers, Barbara has sold over 90 million novels and is one of UK’s most commercially successful authors of all time. Her 39th novel, A Man of Honour, publishes this month (11 November 2021).

It is anticipated that to mark her role as patron, the Leeds Library will set up an annual lecture in the name of Barbara that will coincide with International Women’s Day, as well as an annual literary prize that will aim to champion women’s writing both regionally and nationally.

Martin Staniforth, Chair of the Trustees of The Leeds Library, said:

‘We are honoured that Barbara Taylor Bradford OBE has agreed to support the Library as a patron. As a charity that has championed the work of local writers over a number of years it seems fitting that Barbara, as the most successful author ever to come from Leeds, should be a patron. We are looking forward to working with her over the coming months and years to help establish both an annual lecture and literary award which we hope will inspire more people from the city to take up writing.’

Image: Barbara Taylor Bradford OBE. Photographer- Caroll Taveras. Copyright – Bradford Enterprises.

Barbara Taylor Bradford OBE said:

‘It is a huge privilege to be asked to be a Patron for The Leeds Library, an organisation that shares my commitment to celebrating and supporting creative writing in all of its forms as well as promoting literacy. I am really looking forward to working with everyone at the Library on a number of initiatives that will take place in a city that will forever be special to me.’

Barbara will join Poet Laureate Simon Armitage, writer Caryl Phillips and arts historian Nima Poovaya- Smith as patrons of the Library, which was founded in 1768, has a collection of over 140,000 items and, as a charity, is committed to ensuring that the Library is a thriving, individual library and much-loved cultural institution of Leeds, which is an inspiring and valued home and resource for lovers of books, writing and creativity.