Gregory Maguire

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Gregory Maguire
Gregory Maguire.jpg
Maguire in 2007
Born (1954-06-09) June 9, 1954 (age 69)
Albany, New York, U.S.
OccupationNovelist
Education University at Albany (BA)
Simmons University (MA)
Tufts University (PhD)
GenreFantasy, children's literature
Spouse
Andy Newman
​
(m. 2004)​
Children3
Website
gregorymaguire.com

Gregory Maguire (born June 9, 1954) is an American novelist. He is the author of Wicked , Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister , and several dozen other novels for adults and children. Many of Maguire's adult novels are inspired by classic children's stories. Maguire published his first novel, The Lightning Time, in 1978. Wicked, published in 1995, was his first novel for adults. It was adapted into a popular Broadway musical in 2003.

Contents

Maguire is married to American painter Andy Newman, in one of the first same-sex marriages performed in the state of Massachusetts. They have three children. [1]

Biography

Born and raised in Albany, New York, Gregory Maguire is the youngest of four children born to Helen and John Maguire. His mother died from complications suffered giving birth to him, which prompted his father to send him to live with an aunt. His aunt relinquished him to a local orphanage when he was six months old. He was reclaimed from the orphanage at age two, after his father's remarriage. Maguire has three half-siblings from his father's second marriage. [1]

Schooled in Catholic institutions through high school, [2] he received a BA in English and art from the State University of New York at Albany, an MA in children's literature from Simmons College, and a PhD in English and American literature from Tufts University. [3] His doctoral thesis was on children's fantasy written from 1938 to 1989.

In 1978, at the age of 25, Maguire published his first novel, The Lightning Time. Around the same time, he began to realize he was gay. [1] He was a professor and co-director at the Simmons College Center for the Study of Children's Literature from 1979 to 1986. In 1987, Maguire co-founded a nonprofit educational charity, Children's Literature New England, Inc., and was co-director for twenty-five years. He has lived in Dublin, London, and the greater Boston area. [3]

In 1995, Maguire published his first adult novel, Wicked: the Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West . Though the novel was initially unsuccessful, it sold 500,000 copies by the time the Broadway adaptation opened in 2003. In 2005, ten years after its publication, Wicked spent 26 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. [1]

Maguire met American painter Andy Newman in 1997 at the Blue Mountain Center art colony. Within a month of meeting, they had fallen in love. They adopted three children: Luke and Alex, originally from Cambodia, and Helen, originally from Guatemala. Maguire and Newman were married in June 2004, shortly after same-sex marriage became legal in Massachusetts. [1] They have lived in Concord, Massachusetts since 1999. [4] [5] On April 13, 2009, Maguire and his family were featured on Oprah . [6]

Bibliography

Wicked series

For children

For adults

Short stories

Non-fiction

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Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West is an American novel published in 1995, written by Gregory Maguire with illustrations by Douglas Smith. It is the first in The Wicked Years series, and was followed by Son of a Witch, A Lion Among Men, and Out of Oz. In 2003, it was adapted as the Tony Award-winning Broadway musical Wicked. The musical is in the process of being adapted into a two-part feature film, with the first film scheduled to be released in November 2024 and the second film in November 2025.

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Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister is a 1999 fantasy novel by American writer Gregory Maguire, retelling the tale of Cinderella through the eyes of one of her "ugly stepsisters." In 2002, the book was adapted into a TV movie of the same name directed by Gavin Millar.

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<i>A Barnstormer in Oz</i> Novel by Philip José Farmer

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<i>Out of Oz</i> Novel by Gregory Maguire

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This is a complete bibliography for American children's writer L. Frank Baum.

<i>Cheshire Crossing</i> Webcomic by Andy Weir

Cheshire Crossing is a fantasy webcomic written and originally illustrated by Andy Weir from 2006 to 2008, and later illustrated by Sarah Andersen for Tapas from 2017 to 2019. The latter version was published as a graphic novel by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of Random House, in 2019. The story, taking place in the early 1900s, takes characters from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, and Peter Pan, and follows Alice Liddell, Dorothy Gale, and Wendy Darling after they are united at "Cheshire Crossing" by the mysterious Dr. Ernest Rutherford and Miss Mary Poppins to study their abilities to travel between worlds before facing the combined forces of the reconstituted Wicked Witch of the West and Captain Hook.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Alex Witchell (March 11, 2007). "Mr. Wicked". The New York Times . Archived from the original on March 9, 2021. Retrieved April 30, 2022.
  2. ↑ Sunderland, Mitchell (October 28, 2015). "'Alice in Wonderland' Shows Why Adult Men Are Dumb". Broadly. Retrieved December 9, 2015.
  3. 1 2 "Gregory Maguire – Harper Collins Publishers". Gregorymaguire.com. Archived from the original on December 13, 2013. Retrieved December 4, 2013.
  4. ↑ "Speaker Series: Andy Newman & Gregory Maguire | The Umbrella Arts Center". theumbrellaarts.org. Retrieved February 24, 2023.
  5. ↑ Staff, Community Advocate (April 2, 2021). "Massachusetts is the perfect home for 'Wicked' author Gregory Maguire". Fifty Plus Advocate. Retrieved February 24, 2023.
  6. ↑ "Gregory and Andy's Family Life Video". Oprah.com. Retrieved April 30, 2022.
  7. ↑ Hall, Margaret (February 8, 2024). "Gregory Maguire Writing New Wicked Prequel Elphie". Playbill. Retrieved February 8, 2024.
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