22 Facts About Richard Adams

Richard George Adams was an English novelist and writer of the books Watership Down, Maia, Shardik and The Plague Dogs.

Richard Adams studied modern history at university before serving in the British Army during World War II.

In 1974, two years after Watership Down was published, Adams became a full-time author.

Richard Adams was born on 9 May 1920 in Wash Common, near Newbury, Berkshire, England, the son of Lillian Rosa and Evelyn George Beadon Adams, a doctor.

Richard Adams attended Horris Hill School from 1926 to 1933, and then Bradfield College from 1933 to 1938.

In July 1940, Richard Adams was called up to join the British Army.

Richard Adams was commissioned into the Royal Army Service Corps and was selected for the Airborne Company, where he worked as a brigade liaison.

Richard Adams served in Palestine, Europe, and East Asia but saw no direct action against either the Germans or the Japanese.

Richard Adams received a bachelor's degree in 1948, proceeding MA in 1953.

Richard Adams began to write his own stories in his spare time, reading them to his children and later on, to his grandchildren.

Richard Adams originally began telling the story that would become Watership Down to his two daughters on a car trip.

Richard Adams began writing in 1966, taking two years to complete it.

Richard Adams won both of the most prestigious British children's book awards, one of six authors to do so: the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize.

Richard Adams was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1975.

At one point, Richard Adams served as writer-in-residence at the University of Florida and at Hollins University in Virginia.

Richard Adams was the recipient of the inaugural Whitchurch Arts Award for inspiration in January 2010, presented at the Watership Down pub in Freefolk, Hampshire.

In 1982, Richard Adams served one year as president of the RSPCA.

Besides campaigning against furs, Richard Adams wrote The Plague Dogs to satirize animal experimentation.

Richard Adams made a voyage through the Antarctic in the company of the ornithologist Ronald Lockley.

Richard Adams celebrated his 90th birthday in 2010 with a party at the White Hart in his hometown of Whitchurch, Hampshire, where Sir George Young presented him with a painting by a local artist.

Richard Adams wrote a poetic piece celebrating his home of the past 28 years.

Richard Adams died on 24 December 2016 at the age of 96 in Oxford, England from complications of a blood disorder.