Robert Cormier

Robert Cormier was born in 1925 to Lucien Joseph and Irma M. Cormier, in Leominster, Massachusetts. Cormier began his professional writing career scripting radio commercials. He eventually became an award-winning journalist. Even though he became widely known, he never stopped writing for his local newspaper, the Fitchburg Sentinel. Cormier became a full-time writer after the success of his first adult novel for teenagers, Now and at the Hour (1960); others followed, such as The Chocolate War and After the First Death. He was concerned with the problems facing young people in modern society, which was reflected in his novels. He soon established a reputation as a brilliant and uncompromising writer. His awards include the Margaret A. Edwards Award of the Young Adult Services Division of the American Library Associationa lifetime award that recognizes a particular body of work that provides young adults with a window through which they can view the world, and which will help them to grow and understand themselves and their role in society. Cormier won the annual award in 1991 citing The Chocolate War; I Am the Cheese; and After the First Death.