Neil Gaiman Biography

Fast Facts

• His comic book series "Sandman" won nine Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards and became the first ever comic to receive a literary award, the 1991 World Fantasy Award for Best Short Story
• Was the first author to win the Newbery Medal and the Carnegie Medal for the same book, "The Graveyard Book․"
• He is a patron of The Open Rights Group and The Science Fiction Foundation
• Began his career as a journalist and biographer, with his first published work being a biography of the band Duran Duran
• Quote: "I wouldn't be who I am without libraries․ I was the sort of kid who devoured books, and my happiest times as a boy were when I persuaded my parents to drop me off in the local library on their way to work, and I spent the day there․"
• Quote: "The Ideas aren't the hard bit․․․Creating believable people who do more or less what you tell them to is much harder․ And hardest by far is the process of simply sitting down and putting one word after another․․․"
• Quote: "If writing a novel is a year's exile to a foreign country, writing a short story is a weekend spent somewhere exotic․․․a short story [is] pure story telling․․․You're not going to stay with these characters long enough to live your life with them․"
• Best known as the author of numerous novels, short stories, and comic books, including "American Gods," "Anansi Boys," "Coraline," and "Neverwhere," a number of which have been adapted into films and TV series
• Has written two episodes for the BBC series "Doctor Who," "The Doctor's Wife" and "Nightmare in Silver․"
• Two of his children's stories have been adapted for the stage: "The Wolves in the Walls" as an opera by the Scottish National Theatre in 2006 and "Coraline" as a musical by Stephin Merritt in 2009