Barbara Trapido

Barbara Trapido
Born	Barbara Schuddeboom 1941 (age 83–84) Cape Town, South Africa
Occupation	Novelist
Nationality	British
Education	University of Natal (BA)

Barbara (Louise) Trapido (born 1941 as Barbara Schuddeboom), is a British novelist born in South Africa with German, Danish and Dutch ancestry. ^[1] Born in Cape Town and growing up in Durban she studied at the University of Natal gaining a BA in 1963 before emigrating to London. After many years teaching, she became a full-time writer in 1970. ^[2]

Trapido has published seven novels, three of which have been nominated for the Whitbread Prize. Her semi-autobiographical Frankie & Stankie, one of those shortlisted, which deals with growing up white under apartheid, gained a great deal of critical attention, most of it favourable. It was also longlisted for the Booker prize. She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2011. ^[3]

Barbara Trapido lives with her family in Oxford and some of her books have Oxford connections.

Bibliography

• Brother of the More Famous Jack (1982)
• Noah's Ark (1984)
• Temples of Delight (1990)
• Juggling (1994)
• The Travelling Hornplayer (1998)
• Frankie & Stankie (2003)
• Sex & Stravinsky (2010)

Reviews

• Frankie & Stankie, Observer newspaper
• Frankie & Stankie, Telegraph newspaper
• Sex & Stravinsky, The Independent newspaper

External links

• Barbara Trapido: Biography and critical perspective from the British Council.
• "The awkward squad". Trapido writes in The Guardian newspaper about the process of creating a novel.

References

1. Cosic, Miriam (12 June 2010). "The parallel worlds of Barbara Trapido". The Australian. Retrieved 26 July 2013. Her mother was a shy woman, half-German and half-Danish, who had come from Berlin ... Trapido's father ... grew up in The Hague
2. Barbara Trapido Archived October 23, 2006, at the Wayback Machine
3. "Trapido, Barbara". Royal Society of Literature. 1 September 2023. Retrieved 27 June 2025.