An Evening with Maggie O’Farrell: Land (Part One)

**Mia Sorrenti** (0:00)
Hello, Intelligence Squared members. Senior producer Mia Sorrenti here. How can a novel bring the lives of the past vividly into the present? Today's members' episode is the full recording of our recent live event with award-winning author of Hamnet, Maggie O'Farrell. O'Farrell joined us at the Brighton Dome Corn Exchange to discuss history, memory, and the art of historical fiction.
Marking the publication of her new novel, Land, O'Farrell reflects on the lives of ordinary people shaped by extraordinary moments in history. Drawing on her own family history and the aftermath at the Irish Famine, she explores how fiction can illuminate the past with emotional truth, resilience, and compassion. Let's join our host Claire Almister now, live at the Brighton Dome Corn Exchange.

**Claire Almister** (0:51)
Hello, and a very warm welcome. You've all come to see the phenomenon that is Maggie O'Farrell. So, Maggie was born in Derry, London Derry rather than in Coleraine, wasn't it?

**Maggie O'Farrell** (1:06)
I was born in Coleraine County Derry.

**Claire Almister** (1:09)
County Derry, that's right. I got a bit confused over that. There's quite a different, lots of different sorts of Derrys, which is relevant because you may not, people may not be aware that you are Irish, and that is what is, it's absolutely central to this novel. It's a bit of a departure for you, at least recently. She's one of the most admired writers in this country. One of the few writers, I was just talking to the organizer about it, who now is capable of filling almost, well, filling sort of whole huge theaters. And she has sold something like 40 million books all around the world. And this was even before she got to walk the red carpet in Hollywood this year.
I'm now really embarrassing you, aren't I?
And she won her most recent novel before this was of course Hamnet, for which she won the Women's Prize. And also, did you win the Oscar for it? You did, didn't you?

**Maggie O'Farrell** (2:13)
No. You didn't.
Well, Jessie Buckley won the Oscar.

**Claire Almister** (2:17)
But not for the best adapted screenplay.

**Maggie O'Farrell** (2:19)
No, we were nominated.

**Claire Almister** (2:20)
You were nominated, so you saw, I don't know how many of you saw her in that glorious, glorious pink dress going and insisting on doing your own styling.

**SPEAKER_4** (2:28)
It was so cool.

**Claire Almister** (2:29)
She's so cool.
Anyway, so she's come back with this amazing novel, Land, which was only published on, I think it was Tuesday, so you won't have had the chance to read it. I came in to do this at short notice and I have golepped through it, which it actually puts me in a very nice position. I'm so steeped in Land. It is a very immersive novel. It's a very big novel and it's a very Irish novel.
Before I start asking Maggie questions, I just want to say that we'll be talking for about an hour. You probably know this if you come to these events here regularly, but just in case. Then there'll be half an hour for questions. There are two standing mics at the sides, which we would like you to walk to if you possibly can. If you have any problems with mobility, stick a hand up and we'll do our best to get a roving mic to you. Anyway, so let's start. Welcome, Maggie. Welcome to Brighton.

**Maggie O'Farrell** (3:26)
Thank you very much. It's lovely to be here.

**Claire Almister** (3:28)
So, this book, a novel, is inspired by your great-great-grandfather and a story that you only got to know about quite recently or you investigated quite recently. Tell us how you came to know about it.

**Maggie O'Farrell** (3:42)
Well, I think all families have their myths and many of them. And one in my family, one that we were always told as children was that one of our ancestors had worked. Or I think, I mean, I remember as a child thinking or knowing that one of my ancestors had drawn the first ever map of Ireland, which sounds like a great story, doesn't it? But obviously, it's not entirely true. But when I was a child, we used to, so obviously you can tell by the way I speak, I left Ireland when I was quite young, when I grew up mostly in Britain. But we used to go back every summer. So I used to look out. He always really fascinated me, this kind of ancestor. I used to look out of the window of our car as we drove through Derry, or Donegal, or Galway. I used to imagine, I kind of imagined him as a sort of one man band, probably in some kind of unspecified period dress, definitely some kind of cravat.