1. Neil Richard MacKinnon Gaiman is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, audio theatre, and screenplays.
72 Facts About Neil Gaiman
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Neil Gaiman's works include the comic series The Sandman and the novels Good Omens, Stardust, American Gods, Coraline, Anansi Boys, The Graveyard Book and The Ocean at the End of the Lane.
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Neil Gaiman co-created the TV adaptations of Good Omens and The Sandman.
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Neil Gaiman is the first author to win the Newbery and the Carnegie medals for the same work, The Graveyard Book.
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Neil Richard Gaiman was born on 10 November 1960 in Portchester, Hampshire.
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Neil Gaiman's great-grandfather emigrated to England from Antwerp before 1914 and his grandfather settled in Portsmouth and established a chain of grocery stores, changing the family name from Chaiman to Gaiman.
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Neil Gaiman's father, David Bernard Gaiman, worked in the same chain of stores; his mother, Sheila Gaiman, was a pharmacist.
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Neil Gaiman later won the school English prize and the school reading prize, enabling him to finally acquire the third volume.
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Neil Gaiman was educated at several Church of England schools, including Fonthill School in East Grinstead, Ardingly College, and Whitgift School in Croydon.
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Neil Gaiman lived in East Grinstead for many years, from 1965 to 1980 and again from 1984 to 1987.
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Neil Gaiman sang in a punk rock band Ex Execs, formerly called Chaos.
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Neil Gaiman met his first wife, Mary McGrath, while she was studying Scientology and living in a house in East Grinstead that was owned by his father.
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Lafferty sent Neil Gaiman an encouraging and informative letter back, along with literary advice.
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Neil Gaiman has named Roger Zelazny as the author who influenced him the most.
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Neil Gaiman takes inspiration from the folk tales tradition, citing Otta F Swire's book on the legends of the Isle of Skye as his inspiration for The Truth Is a Cave in the Black Mountains.
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Neil Gaiman wrote and reviewed extensively for the British Fantasy Society.
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Neil Gaiman wrote interviews and articles for many British magazines, including Knave.
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Neil Gaiman has said he ended his journalism career in 1987 because British newspapers regularly publish untruths as fact.
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Neil Gaiman continued his professional relationship with Moore by contributing quotations for the supplemental materials in the Watchmen comic book series.
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Comics historian Les Daniels called Neil Gaiman's work "astonishing" and noted that The Sandman was "a mixture of fantasy, horror, and ironic humor such as comic books had never seen before".
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Neil Gaiman produced two stories for DC's Secret Origins series in 1989: a Poison Ivy tale drawn by Mark Buckingham and a Riddler story illustrated by Bernie Mireault and Matt Wagner.
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In 1990, Neil Gaiman wrote The Books of Magic, a four-part mini-series that provided a tour of the mythological and magical parts of the DC Universe through a frame story about an English teenager who discovers that he is destined to be the world's greatest wizard.
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Neil Gaiman wrote a semi-autobiographical story about a boy's fascination with Michael Moorcock's anti-hero Elric of Melnibone for Ed Kramer's anthology Tales of the White Wolf.
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Neil Gaiman contributed a twelve-part Metamorpho serial drawn by Mike Allred for Wednesday Comics, a weekly newspaper-style series.
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Neil Gaiman oversaw The Sandman Universe, a line of comic books published by Vertigo.
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In 2011, Pratchett said that while the entire novel was a collaborative effort and most of the ideas could be credited to both of them, Pratchett did a larger portion of writing and editing if for no other reason than Neil Gaiman's scheduled involvement with Sandman.
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Neil Gaiman has since revised the novel twice, the first time for an American audience unfamiliar with the London Underground, the second time because he felt unsatisfied with the originals.
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American Gods became one of Neil Gaiman's best-selling and multi-award-winning novels upon its release in 2001.
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Neil Gaiman has not written a direct sequel to American Gods but he has revisited the characters.
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In 2002, Neil Gaiman entered the world of children's books with the dark fairy tale Coraline.
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In September 2016, Neil Gaiman announced that he had been working for some years on retellings of Norse mythology.
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Neil Gaiman wrote the 1996 BBC dark fantasy television series Neverwhere.
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Neil Gaiman co-wrote the screenplay for the movie MirrorMask with his old friend Dave McKean for McKean to direct.
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Neil Gaiman co-wrote the script for Robert Zemeckis's Beowulf with Roger Avary, a collaboration that has proved productive for both writers.
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Neil Gaiman has expressed interest in collaborating on a film adaptation of the Epic of Gilgamesh.
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Neil Gaiman was the only person other than J Michael Straczynski to write a Babylon 5 script in the series' last three seasons, contributing to the season five episode "Day of the Dead".
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Neil Gaiman has written at least three drafts of a screenplay adaptation of Nicholson Baker's novel The Fermata for director Robert Zemeckis, although the project was stalled while Zemeckis made The Polar Express and the Neil Gaiman-Roger Avary-penned Beowulf film.
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Neil Gaiman was featured in the History Channel documentary Comic Book Superheroes Unmasked.
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In 2007, Neil Gaiman announced that after ten years in development, the feature film of Death: The High Cost of Living would finally begin production with a screenplay by Neil Gaiman that he would direct for Warner Independent.
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Neil Gaiman wrote an episode of the long-running BBC science fiction series Doctor Who, broadcast in 2011 during Matt Smith's second series as the Doctor.
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Neil Gaiman made his return to Doctor Who with an episode titled "Nightmare in Silver", broadcast on 11 May 2013.
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Neil Gaiman returned to the Whoniverse in 2020 for the web series Doctor Who: Lockdown; he wrote the mini-episode "Rory's Story" which saw Arthur Darvill reprise his role of Rory Williams.
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Also in 2011, it was announced that Neil Gaiman would be writing the script to a new film version of Journey to the West.
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Neil Gaiman appeared as himself on The Simpsons episode "The Book Job", which was broadcast on 20 November 2011.
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Neil Gaiman received a Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form Hugo Award in 2020 for the TV miniseries adaptation of Good Omens, for which he wrote the screenplay.
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Neil Gaiman voiced Gef in the black comedy film Nandor Fodor and the Talking Mongoose, one of the film's titular characters, in 2023.
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In 2021, Neil Gaiman was cast as Duke Aubrey in an adaptation of Hope Mirrlees' Lud-in-the-Mist, a novel Neil Gaiman had previously proclaimed one of his favourites, for BBC Radio 4.
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In 2015, Neil Gaiman delivered a 100-minute lecture for the Long Now Foundation entitled How Stories Last about the nature of storytelling and how stories persist in human culture.
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In 1993, Neil Gaiman was contracted by Todd McFarlane to write a single issue of Spawn, for Image Comics, which McFarlane had recently co-founded.
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In issue No 9 of the series, Neil Gaiman introduced the characters Angela, Cogliostro, and Medieval Spawn.
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McFarlane initially agreed that Neil Gaiman had not signed away any rights to the characters, and negotiated with Neil Gaiman to effectively "swap" McFarlane's interest in the character Marvelman.
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McFarlane had purchased an interest in the character when Eclipse Comics was liquidated while Neil Gaiman was interested in being able to continue his aborted run of the Marvelman title.
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McFarlane later changed his initial position, claiming that Neil Gaiman's work had only been work-for-hire and that McFarlane owned all of Neil Gaiman's creations entirely.
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Neil Gaiman had written Marvel 1602 in 2003 to help fund this project and all of Neil Gaiman's profits for the original issues of the series were donated to Marvels and Miracles.
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Neil Gaiman moved near Menomonie, Wisconsin, in 1992 to be closer to the family of his then-wife, Mary McGrath, with whom he has three children.
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Neil Gaiman was close friends with fellow author Terry Pratchett until the latter's death in 2015.
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Neil Gaiman met Amanda Palmer in 2008, and the two entered a relationship in 2009, marrying in 2011.
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Weeks later, their marriage collapsed and Neil Gaiman left the country, travelling from New Zealand to his holiday home on the Isle of Skye, which broke COVID-19 lockdown rules.
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Neil Gaiman published an apology on his website, saying he had endangered the local community.
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Neil Gaiman stated the split was "my fault, I'm afraid", and requested privacy.
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Claire described non-consensual kissing and groping by Neil Gaiman after meeting him at a book tour event, with Neil Gaiman making a $60,000 payment to her in August 2022.
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Wallner says that on one occasion Neil Gaiman grabbed her hand and placed it on his penis while his young son was asleep in the same bed.
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Neil Gaiman was dropped as a client by his agent Casarotto Ramsay.
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In February 2001, when Neil Gaiman had completed writing American Gods, his publishers set up a promotional website featuring a weblog in which Neil Gaiman described the day-to-day process of revising, publishing, and promoting the novel.
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Gaiman generally posts to the blog describing the day-to-day process of being Neil Gaiman and writing, revising, publishing, or promoting whatever the current project is.
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In 2013, Neil Gaiman was named by IGN as one of "The Best Tweeters in Comics", describing his posts as "sublime".
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Neil Gaiman is godfather to Tori Amos's daughter Tash, and wrote a poem called "Blueberry Girl" for Tori and Tash.
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Neil Gaiman read the poem aloud to an audience at the Sundance Kabuki Theater in San Francisco on 5 October 2008 during his book reading tour for The Graveyard Book.
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Neil Gaiman is a supporter of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and has served on its board of directors.
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In 2013, Neil Gaiman was named co-chair of the organization's newly formed advisory board.
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In 2022, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Neil Gaiman supported Ukraine by announcing on Twitter that he does not want to renew contracts with Russian publishers.
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In 2023, Neil Gaiman signed an open letter addressed to Russian president Vladimir Putin, alongside over 100 other public figures, calling for the release of Russian prisoner Alexei Navalny.