Lloyd Chudley Alexander grew up in the suburb of Drexel Hill. His father was a stockbroker and their family was greatly affected by the Great Depression. According to Alexander, his parents didn't read books and only bought them from the Salvation Army "to fill up empty shelves."
Alexander graduated from Upper Darby High School in 1940, and was inducted into the school's Wall of Fame in 1995. He decided he wanted to be a writer at age 15, but his parents were so upset that they placed him at Haverford College just down the road from home (although he left after completing only a single term). Looking for adventure, he served in the US Army in World War II, where he rose to be a staff sergeant in intelligence and counterintelligence after he trained in Wales, which would become the setting of so many of his books. Alexander then attended the University of Paris, where he met Janine Denni. They were married in 1946. Alexander died May 17, 2007, two weeks after the death of his wife of sixty-one years. He is buried at Arlington Cemetery Co in Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania. His daughter, Madeline Khalil, died in 1990.
Alexander's book "The Marvelous Misadventures of Sebastian," about a 18th-century fiddler, won a 1971 National Book Award. He also won a 1982 American Book Award for Westmark.
The fifth book in Alexander's The Chronicles of Prydain series, The High King won the 1969 Newbery Medal and was a finalist for both the National Book Award and the American Book Award.[3] The second book in the series, The Black Cauldron, was a 1966 Newbery Honor book. The fourth book in the series, Taran Wanderer, was a School Library Journal Best Book of the Year.
Among his other awards were the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award for The Fortune-Tellers (1992). This author has been recommended by 155 other readers. | |
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