The Gawgon and The Boy

Front Cover
Dutton Children's Books, 2001 - Juvenile Fiction - 199 pages
"Better a Gawgon than a silly old goose", Aunt Annie tells young David when he lets slip his private nickname for her-a mispronunciation of the mythical beast. David is recuperating from a near-fatal illness and must stay out of school and be tutored. To his dismay, old Aunt Annie, a member of his highly eccentric extended family, volunteers. David has always been a dreamer, thinking up and losing himself in adventures. His dread of the sharp-tongued old lady turns first to surprise and then admiration as she proves to be imaginative, irreverent, and downright extraordinary. Soon his witty companion costars in his fantasies, as The Gawgon and The Boy vanquish emperors, scale mountains, fool the gods. By turns tender and raucous, with something for everyone, Alexander's timeless storytelling magically recreates a time past.

From inside the book

Contents

The SeaFox
5
The Cupped Bay
11
The BackAlley Gang
21
Copyright

18 other sections not shown

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

About the author (2001)

Lloyd Alexander, January 30, 1924 - May 17, 2007 Born Lloyd Chudley Alexander on January 30, 1924, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Allan Audley and Edna Chudley Alexander, Lloyd knew from a young age that he wanted to write. He was reading by the time he was 3, and though he did poorly in school, at the age of fifteen, he announced that he wanted to become a writer. At the age of 19 in 1942, Alexander dropped out of the West Chester State Teachers College in Pennsylvania after only one term. In 1943, he attended Lafayette College in Easton, PA, before dropping out again and joining the United States Army during World War II. Alexander served in the Intelligence Department, stationed in Wales, and then went on to Counter-Intelligence in Paris, where he was promoted to Staff Sergeant. When the war ended in '45, Alexander applied to the Sorbonne, but returned to the States in '46, now married. Alexander worked as an unpublished writer for seven years, accepting positions such as cartoonist, advertising copywriter, layout artist, and associate editor for a small magazine. Directly after the war, he had translated works for such artists as Jean Paul Sartre. In 1955, "And Let the Credit Go" was published, Alexander's first book which led to 10 years of writing for an adult audience. He wrote his first children's book in 1963, entitled "Time Cat," which led to a long career of writing for children and young adults. Alexander is best known for his "Prydain Chronicles" which consist of "The Book of Three" in 1964, "The Black Cauldron" in 1965 which was a Newbery Honor Book, as well as an animated motion picture by Disney which appeared in 1985, "The Castle of Llyr" in 1966, "Taran Wanderer" in 1967, a School Library Journal's Best Book of the Year and "The High King" which won the Newberry Award. Many of his other books have also received awards, such as "The Fortune Tellers," which was a Boston Globe Horn Book Award winner. In 1986, Alexander won the Regina Medal for Lifetime Achievement from the Catholic Library Association. His titles have been translated into many languages including, Dutch, Spanish, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Serbo-Croation and Swedish. He died on May 17, 2007.

Bibliographic information