He published his first book 62 years ago.
Now, at the age of 87, Alan Garner is the oldest ever author to be longlisted for this year’s Booker Prize.
But if the British writer - who will celebrate his 88th birthday on the night of the winner’s ceremony - is to win the prestigious award for his novel Treacle Walker, he will have to fend off someone 67 years his junior.
Debut American author Leila Mottley, 20, is the youngest ever to be longlisted for her book Nightcrawling.
The pair will go up against the previously shortlisted Zimbabwean author, NoViolet Bulawayo for her novel Glory, Brit Graham Macrae for Case Study and Americans Elizabeth Strout and Karen Joy Fowler for Oh William! and Booth.
Also on the list are debut novelists Maddie Mortimer, a London-born Bristol graduate, for Maps of our Spectacular Bodies and American Selby Wynn Schwartz for After Sappho.
The Booker judges, chaired by cultural historian Neil MacGregor, said that this year’s 13 longlisted books ‘reflect the preoccupations of our planet over the last few years’.
‘Unsurprisingly, in the wake of the pandemic, they address how we imagine disease as a living enemy to be fought on a daily basis, questions of racial and gender injustice, and the fragility of the political order,’ Mr MacGregor said.