Louis Sachar

Louis Sachar 2006

Louis Sachar [ ˈsækɚ ] (born March 20, 1954 in East Meadow , New York ) is an American children's author .

Life

Louis Sachar was born on March 20, 1954 in the city of East Meadow, New York State, and moved with his parents to Tustin , California when he was nine years old. He showed interest in various literature at an early stage. After high school, he went to Antioch College , Ohio, where he studied economics and law. The death of his father finally led to his first degree being abandoned. He moved back to his mother and worked as a cleaning supplies salesman.

After a while, Sachar moved to the University of Berkeley , California, where he also studied economics. On the side, he worked as an assistant teacher in a third grade and took over the afternoon supervision at Hillside Elementary School. There he was nicknamed "Louis the Yard Teacher" (dt. Louis, the court teacher).

In 1976, Sachar obtained his first degree and started writing children's books. In his first book "Sideways Stories From Wayside School" he processed his experiences as a primary school teacher and court supervisor. The people appearing in it were modeled on real students. The writing time was only nine months.

In the following years Sachar worked during the day as an employee in a pullover store in Connecticut, in the evening as a writer for children's books. His already mentioned first work was published for the first time in 1978. At the same time he studied law at Hastings College in San Francisco and passed the bar exam in 1980. Between 1980 and 1988 he worked as a lawyer and continued to write novels for children and young people. From 1989 he earned enough money to stop working as a lawyer.

He has now written more than 20 books and writing has become his main occupation. His book " Holes " (1998) won renowned literary prizes in the USA, including the National Book Award for Young People's Literature , and it climbed to number 2 on the American bestseller lists. The film adaptation with Sigourney Weaver was also a great success.

He now lives in Austin, Texas with his wife, Carla (née Askew), whom he met while studying at elementary school and married in 1985, and their daughter Sherre, who was born in 1987 and works as a zookeeper.

Books

• 1976: Sideways Stories From Wayside School. Bloomsbury Publishing, London 2010, ISBN 978-1-4088-0172-7 .
• 1988: The Curse of David Ballinger. (OT: The Boy Who Lost His Face ). German Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-423-62429-9 .
• 1996: You're kidding, Gary Boone !. German Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-423-62222-9 .
• 1998: holes. The secrets of Green Lake . (OT: Holes ) Oldenbourg, Munich 2012, ISBN 3-637-01539-0 .
• 2004: Bradley, last row, last place. (OT: There's a Boy in the Girl's Bathroom ). German Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-423-62212-1 .
• 2006: small steps. (OT: Small Steps ). Berliner Taschenbuch Verlag BVT, Berlin 2007, ISBN 3-8333-5000-8 .
• 2015: Mud or The Heath Cliff Disaster. (OT: Fuzzy Mud ) Beltz, Weinheim 2015, ISBN 978-3-407-81199-8 .

Awards

• 1999: ALA Best Books for Young Adults : Holes
• 1999: National Book Award in the youth book category for holes
• 1999: Newbery Medal for Holes
• 2000: LUCHS for Holes
• 2006: JuBu Book of the Month for Small Steps

Web links

• Louis Sachar official website
• Literature by and about Louis Sachar in the catalog of the German National Library
• Short biography and reviews of works by Louis Sachar at perlentaucher.de
• Louis Sachar in the Internet Speculative Fiction Database (English)
• "Louis Sachar Interview Transcript" (February 23, 2006) - scholastic.com (see also 2005 and 2000)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Louis Sachar: Holes . 1st edition. Cornelsen , Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-464-31051-9 , pp. 184 .
2. ^ Judith Huber: Louis Sachar. Biography. inhaltsdaten.de, accessed on June 26, 2016 . 
3. ↑ Evan Smith: Louis Sachar. Interview. TexasMonthly, January 2006, accessed June 26, 2016 .