{"id":673355,"date":"2026-07-04T12:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-04T12:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/673355\/"},"modified":"2026-07-04T12:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T12:03:08","slug":"esther-freud-my-parents-died-within-four-days-of-each-other-i-was-engulfed-life-and-style","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/673355\/","title":{"rendered":"Esther Freud: \u2018My parents died within four days of each other. I was engulfed\u2019 | Life and style"},"content":{"rendered":"

Born in London, Esther Freud, 63, is the daughter of Bernardine Coverley and Lucian Freud. She trained as an actor and, in 1992, released her debut novel, Hideous Kinky<\/a>, which was made into a film starring Kate Winslet in 1998. Freud\u2019s work has been translated into 13 languages, and\u00a0her 10th adult novel, My Sister and Other Lovers<\/a>, is out in paperback. She has three children with the actor David\u00a0Morrissey, and lives between Suffolk and London with her current partner.<\/p>\n

What is your greatest fear?
Decline.<\/p>\n

What is your earliest memory?
Making Fanta with seawater and sand\u00a0on the beach at Formentera with\u00a0my sister Bella.<\/p>\n

What is the trait you most deplore\u00a0in\u00a0yourself?
I can always see two points of view, which makes it hard to have a row.<\/p>\n

What is the trait you most deplore\u00a0in\u00a0others?
An inability to see the other side.<\/p>\n

What was your most embarrassing\u00a0moment?
I bumped into an old schoolteacher and her even more ancient and deaf sister, and she shouted to her, \u201cRemember Esther? Now she writes books \u2026 ABOUT HERSELF.\u201d<\/p>\n

What is your most treasured possession?
A painting by my father of my baby son.<\/p>\n

Describe yourself in three words
Small, determined, lucky.<\/p>\n

What would your superpower be?
To speak before I thought.<\/p>\n

What makes you unhappy?
Cruelty.<\/p>\n

Who would play you in the\u00a0film\u00a0of\u00a0your\u00a0life?
Carrie Mullan played me beautifully in\u00a0the film Hideous Kinky.<\/p>\n

Who is your celebrity crush?
Lily King<\/a> \u2013 when I\u2019m reading her books\u00a0I love her so deeply.<\/p>\n

What did you want to be when you\u00a0were growing up?
An acrobat.<\/p>\n

What was the last lie that you told?
I\u2019m a terrible liar \u2013 I start confessing halfway through.<\/p>\n

What do you owe your parents?
Inspiration.<\/p>\n

To whom would you like to\u00a0say\u00a0sorry,\u00a0and why?
Sorry is such an underrated word \u2013\u00a0I\u00a0use\u00a0it liberally.<\/p>\n

What does love feel like?
Safety or alarm, I can never\u00a0decide\u00a0which.<\/p>\n

What has been your biggest disappointment?
Not joining the circus.<\/p>\n

If not yourself, who would you\u00a0like\u00a0to\u00a0be?
Katherine Rundell<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When did you last cry and why?
Talking about the hardships of my mother\u2019s life \u2013 she would not approve.<\/p>\n

When\u2019s the last time you changed your mind about something significant?
Last week, when I decided to rewrite the children\u2019s book I\u2019ve been working on.<\/p>\n

What is the closest you\u2019ve come\u00a0to\u00a0death?
My parents died within four days of\u00a0each other. I was engulfed as I ran from one bedside to another.<\/p>\n

What single thing would improve the\u00a0quality of your life?
For the words to fly from my fingers as\u00a0just occasionally they do.<\/p>\n

What keeps you awake at night?
Did I behave in the right way?<\/p>\n

What is the most important lesson life\u00a0has taught you?
Life\u2019s too short to take offence.<\/p>\n

What happens when we die?
We watch over those we love.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Born in London, Esther Freud, 63, is the daughter of Bernardine Coverley and Lucian Freud. She trained as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":673356,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[96,59,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-673355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-gb","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/673355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=673355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/673355\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/673356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=673355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=673355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=673355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}