The Owl Service

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The Owl Service (ISBN 0152017984) is a children's novel by Alan Garner first published in 1967. It is a contemporary interpretation, which Garner described as an "expression of the myth", of the story of Blodeuwedd.

Contents

Plot summary

Three teenagers unwittingly re-enact an important incident from Welsh mythology when they meet in rural Wales in the 1960s. Template:Sect-stub

Literary significance & criticism

In essays collected in The Voice That Thunders, Garner has described much of the genesis of the book. He covers his discovery of the Mabinogion as a student, how the fourth branch "struck me as being such a modern story of the damage people do to each other, not through evil but through the unhappy combination of circumstance that throws otherwise harmless personalities together", and his friendship with Dafydd Rees Cilwern, the basis for the character of Huw in the book.

Awards and nominations

It was awarded both the Guardian Award and the Carnegie Medal.

Film, TV or theatrical adaptations

The Owl Service was made into a Granada Television television serial in 1969. It was dramatized for BBC Radio 4 in 2000.

External links