Lloyd Alexander was born on January 30, 1924, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and raised in that city. "Family life as a child was unextraordinary. My childhood was certainly no more miserable than anyone else's, although at the time, I thought it was. I learned to read quite young and have been an avid reader ever since, even though my parents and relatives were not great readers. I was more or less left to my own devices and interests, which, after all, may not be such a bad idea. My relatives were as Dickensian an assortment of people as anyone could imagine, and that might have been an advantage, too."

Although he had an early interest in music and took piano lessons as a child, Alexander announced to his family, at the age of fifteen, his intentions to become a poet. "Poetry, my father warned, was no practical career; I would do...