Lloyd Alexander

At 83 years old, Lloyd Alexander physical status not available right now. We will update Lloyd Alexander's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

Writing career

Alexander wrote mainly fantasy, non-fiction, and adult translations in Philadelphia for about fifteen years. He spent his days as a potter's apprentice for his sister, desperate for a job. He began writing advertising copy and began to receive more royalties for his translations, prompting him to buy a house for his family in Kellytown at the end of 1948. However, he resigned after three months, requiring his wife to work in a textile mill to make ends meet. Alexander continued to write assiduously, but no publishers had paid him for seven years.

In the New Directions Annual, one of his short stories, "The Amazing Symphony" (1949), was published, a surrealistic piece based on Berlioz's remarks on the Symphonie fantastique. Alexander's breakthrough was his book And Let the Credit Go (1955), his first autobiographical work in which he concentrated on his early years as a bank messenger in his youth. My Five Tigers (1956), his second book about his cats, was released, carrying on the trend of writing about topics that are familiar to him. He found work as a copyeditor and a cartoonist, where he had spent his remaining four adult books. Janine is French (1959) and My Love Affair with Music (1960), two semi-autobiographical books: Alexander co-authored Park Avenue Vet (1960), a group of cats, with Louis Camuti. The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals later commissioned their history, which Alexander wrote about as Fifty Years in the Doghouse (1964). During that time, he wrote two non-fiction books for children and biographies for August Bondi and Aaron Lopez, which were the former recipients of the National Jewish Book Award in 1959. Time Cat (1963), Alexander's second book in the fantasy genre, was his first of the genre: Time Cat (1963). It was later described as "the most innovative and liberating experience of my life." The novel tells the story of a cat that can return to its former lives in different time periods, which Alexander researched thoroughly. William Michael Ryan saved animals as part of his work as a special agent for the ASPCA, fifty years in the Doghouse (1964), reprinted as Send for Ryan.

He then specialized in children's fantasy, the subject of his best-known works, at nearly forty years old. His wartime service in Wales introduced him to castles and scenery that would be used in many of his books. Alexander, especially Mabinogion, was particularly fascinated with Welsh mythology. The novel The Book of Three is based on a fragment from Myvyrian Archaiology. Alexander opted for a trilogy called The Sons of Llyr, which was published by Henry Holt and Company. Alexander resisted simplifying the Welsh names, claiming that they gave the book a certain mood and strangeness. The Chronicles of Prydain began after the first book, The Book of Three (1964), was published. In 1965, The Black Cauldron, the second book in the series, was published. Alexander, who began with The Castle of Llyr (1966), felt his tale needed to be told in four books rather than three, and he wrote his fourth and final book The High King of Prydain. During this time, he was also an associate editor at the Delaware Valley Announcer. Alexander hastily concluded The High King, afraid he will not be able to finish his epic after a near-death experience. However, Ann Durell, his editor, suggested that he write a fourth book in tribute to The High King (1968) and The Prince of Llyr (1968); this book became Taran Wanderer (1967). The five books explore a young man named Taran, who aspires to be a sword-bearing hero but has only the title Assistant Pig-Keeper. He goes from youth to maturity, and he must determine whether or not he wants to be the High King of Prydain. Alexander wrote two spin-off children's books from the Prydain series Coll and His White Pig (1965) and The Truthful Harp (1967). In 1969, Alexander received the Newbery Medal for The High King.

The Marvelous Misadventures of Sebastian (1970), Alexander's book, was rejected after its first submission, and he rewrote it three times before it was published. In 1971, it received the National Book Award. He wrote two picture books: The King's Fountain (1971), in which he collaborated with writer Ezra Jack Keats, and The Four Donkeys (1972). In 1973, he wrote The Cat Who Wanted to Be a Man. The Foundling: And Other Prydain Stories of Prydain, a companion book to the Prydain series, was released the same year Alexander published The Foundling: And Other Tales of Prydain. Alexander was author-in-residence at Temple University from 1970 to 1974, following Prydain's success. He once described it as educational for him and as "rather like being a visiting uncle," who has a marvelous time with his nephews and nieces, but then goes back to the parents to deal with threats of whooping cough, mending socks, and blackmailing the children to sort out the mess in their rooms. When suffering from depression and releasing it in 1975, Alexander wrote The Wizard in the Tree. Arbican was based on Alexander and his personal struggles. In 1977, he published The Town Cats, which attracted a more favourable critical response than The Wizard in the Tree. His next book, The First Two Lives of Lukas-Kasha, set in a fantasy world based on 15th-century Persia, was published in 1978. It was named both the Silver Slate Pencil Award in Holland and the Austrian Book Award in Austria.

Westmark (1981 to 1984) and Vesper Holly (1987 to 2005), Alexander's other fictional series. In a fictional European republic about 1800, Westmark includes a former printer's apprentice who was instrumental in the revolt and civil war. Vesper Holly, a wealthy and spirited Philadelphia orphanage, has lived in several fictional countries since the 1870s. The Fortune-Tellers (1992), a picture book illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman, caused some controversies. Some believed that the tale was European in origin and hence inappropriate for its African setting. The Golden Dream of Carlo Chuchio was Alexander's last book, published in August 2007.

Alexander helped develop the children's literary journal Cricket and served on its editorial board. He served on the library committee of World Book Encyclopedia in 1974 and 1982, as a member of the Friends of the International Board on Books for Young People. Alexander maintained a slew of hours, rising at 4 a.m. and late afternoon, before enjoying his sole meal with his wife. Even as he did not feel inspired, he maintained his routine, saying that he could not depend on inspiration alone. He corresponded with followers who had occasion visited him in his house.

Alexander died of cancer on May 17, 2007, just a few weeks after his wife's death of sixty-one years. Madeleine Khalil, his stepdaughter, had predeceased both him and her mother in 1995. He was saved by his five step-grandchildren and five step-grandchildren. He is buried at Drexel Hill's Arlington Cemetery.

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