Who is Alan Garner? Oldest Booker Prize 2022 Nominee

Who is Alan Garner? With the release of the Booker Prize list 2022 known as the "Booker dozen" on Tuesday, July 26, Alan Garner has gained the internet spotlight for being the oldest nominee on the list. Booker List 2022 comes as much-deserved recognition for veteran writer Alan Garner.

Alan Garner has been widely recognised as a children’s writer, even after his foray as a writer in various genres including mythology, archaeology, the transient rhythms of vernacular speech, and inner visions. He got nominated in the Booker Longlist for his book Treacle Walker.

The longlist of nominations for The Booker Prize 2022 includes The Colony by Audrey Magee, After Sappho by Selby Wynn Schwartz, Glory by NoViolet Bulawayo, Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan, Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley, Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies by Maddie Mortimer, Case Study by Graeme Macrae Burnet, Treacle Walker by Alan Garner, The Trees by Percival Everett, Trust by Hernan Diaz, The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka, Oh William! by Elizabeth Strout and Booth Karen Joy Fowler. The judges on the panel for The Booker Prize 2022 are Neil MacGregor, Shahidha Bari, Helen Castor, M. John Harrison, and Alain Mabanckou.

Who Is Alan Garner? Nominated for Treacle Walker

Born on October 17, 1934, Alan Garner hails from Cheshire, England. He is widely recognised as a children's novelist, known best for his retelling of folk tales and fantasy novels. His works are known to have a peculiar style of writing, be it children's books or other genres, they all seemed to be rooted in myths and legends. Spending most of his growing years near Alderly Edge, called The Edge, Garner was taken by the British folklore, which reflects in most of his works.

Alan Garner attended the Manchester Grammar School and Magdalen College at Oxford University. He rose to fame after he released a trilogy that includes The Weirdstone of Brisingamen: A Tale of Alderley (1960), The Moon of Gomrath (1963), and Boneland.  These fantasy fiction books earned him the recognition of being a children's writer. Most of his books follow the narrative of magical forces and the quest for something bigger, and fictionalised stories from the past.

Some of his works include Elidor (1965), The Owl Service (1967; adapted into a television film 1969- a retelling of  Welsh mythological compendium the Mabinogion). Red Shift (1973), Strandloper (1996- the true story of an Englishman in Australia) Thursbitch (2003) The Stone Book Quartet—The Stone Book (1976), Granny Reardun (1977), Tom Fobble’s Day (1977), The Aimer Gate (1978). Fairy Tales of Gold (1979), The Lad of the Gad (1980), A Bag of Moonshine (1986), Once Upon a Time (1993), The Voice That Thunders: Essays and Lectures (1997) The Well of the Wind (1998) and Collected Folk Tales (2011).

Back in 2001, Alan Garner was made Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE), and his archives were kept at Brigham Young University in Utah, U.S.book. His book Treacle Walker (2021) where a boy meets a mysterious rag-and-bone man, a fictionalised narrative of happenings of his ancestors' lives landed him a Bookers List nomination in 2022. Alan Garner recalled a conversation he had with his friend about Treacle walker, in an interview, where his friend on reading the manuscript said that he (Garner) had written his autobiography. Garner stated that he would never write an autobiography, to which his friend replied- 'that's because you’ve never written anything else.’