Morris Gleitzman is one of Australia's most successful authors. He was born in England in 1953 and emigrated to Australia in 1969 so he could escape from school and become a Very Famous Writer. His brilliantly comic style has endeared him to adults and children alike and he is now one of Australia's most successful authors, both internationally and at home.Before realising that dream, he had a colourful career as a paperboy, bottle-shop shelf-stacker, department store Santa Claus, frozen chicken defroster, fashion-design assistant and sugar-mill employee. In between he mananged to gain a degree in Professional Writing at the Canberra College of Advanced Education.
Morris has writeen a number of feature films and telemovie screenplays, including The Other Facts of Life and Second Childhood, both produced by The Australian Children's Television Foundation. The Other Facts of Life won the 1985 AWGIE Award for the Best Original Children's Film Script. He has also written live stage material for performers including Rolf Harris, Pamela Stephenson and the Governor General of Australia. Morris is well known through his semi-autobiographical columns in The Age and Sydney Morning Herald magazine, Good Weekend, which he wrote for nine years. Collections of his columns have been published by Pan Macmillan in Just Looking and Gleitzman on Sunday, and by Penguin in Self Helpless.
