Editing Alan Garner (section)

{{Short description|English novelist (born 1934)}}
{{Other people||Alan Garner (disambiguation)}}
{{Use British English|date=April 2014}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=September 2020}}
{{Infobox writer
| honorific_suffix = {{postnominals|country=GBR|size=100%|OBE|FRSL}}
| name             = Alan Garner
| birth_name       = 
| image            = Alan Garner.JPG
| imagesize        = 200px
| caption          = Garner in 2011
| birth_date       = {{birth date and age|df=y|1934|10|17}}
| birth_place      = [[Congleton]], [[Cheshire]], England
| death_date       = 
| death_place      = 
| spouse           = Griselda Garner (m. 1972)
| occupation       = Writer, [[folklore|folklorist]]
| period           = 1960–present <!-- Weirdstone publication date -->
| genre            = [[Children's literature|Children's]] [[fantasy]], [[low fantasy]], folklore
| notableworks     = {{plainlist|
* ''[[The Weirdstone of Brisingamen]]''
* ''[[The Moon of Gomrath]]''
* ''[[Elidor]]''
* ''[[The Owl Service]]''
* ''[[The Stone Book Quartet]]''
}}
| awards           = {{awd|[[Carnegie Medal (literary award)|Carnegie Medal]]|1967}} {{awd|[[Guardian Prize]]|1968}}
| signature        = Alan Garner signature.svg
}}

'''Alan Garner''' {{postnominals|country=GBR|size=100%|OBE|FRSL}} (born 17 October 1934) is an English novelist best known for his [[children's fantasy]] novels and his retellings of traditional British folk tales. Much of his work is rooted in the landscape, history and folklore of his native county of [[Cheshire]], [[North West England]], being set in the region and making use of the native [[Cheshire dialect]].

Born in [[Congleton]], Garner grew up in [[Alderley Edge]], and spent much of his youth in the wooded area known locally as "The Edge", where he gained an early interest in the folklore of the region. Studying at [[Manchester Grammar School]] and then briefly at [[University of Oxford|Oxford University]], in 1957 he moved to the village of Blackden, where he bought and renovated an Early Modern Period (circa 1590) building known as Toad Hall. His first novel, ''[[The Weirdstone of Brisingamen]]'', was published in 1960. A children's fantasy novel set on the Edge, it incorporated elements of local folklore in its plot and characters. Garner wrote a sequel, ''[[The Moon of Gomrath]]'' (1963), and a third book, ''[[Boneland]]'' (2012). He wrote several fantasy novels, including ''[[Elidor]]'' (1965), ''[[The Owl Service]]'' (1967) and ''[[Red Shift (novel)|Red Shift]]'' (1973).

Turning away from fantasy as a genre, Garner produced ''[[The Stone Book Quartet]]'' (1979), a series of four short novellas detailing a day in the life of four generations of his family. He also published a series of British folk tales which he had rewritten in a series of books entitled ''Alan Garner's Fairy Tales of Gold'' (1979), ''Alan Garner's Book of British Fairy Tales'' (1984) and ''A Bag of Moonshine'' (1986). In his subsequent novels, ''[[Strandloper (novel)|Strandloper]]'' (1996) and ''[[Thursbitch (novel)|Thursbitch]]'' (2003), he continued writing tales revolving around Cheshire, although without the fantasy elements which had characterised his earlier work.