Marc Brown (author)

Marc Brown was raised in Erie, Pennsylvania, where his father worked on the railroad. He grew up with three younger sisters. As a child, Brown had a close relationship with his Grandma Thora who passionately encouraged him to pursue art from a young age, and captivated him with made-up stories (including scary tales told without her false teeth). Many people in Brown's childhood, including Grandma Thora, were direct inspirations for characters he later wrote in the Arthur series. The character Mr. Ratburn is based on Brown's seventh grade algebra teacher, Gary Rathbun, and his own best friend, Terry Johnson, was the basis for Buster. ==Career==

at the National Book Festival in 2022Brown graduated from Cleveland Institute of Art in 1968 with a degree in graphic design. In 1970, Brown illustrated his first book, What Makes the Sun Shine by Isaac Asimov. Before Brown pursued children's literature, he attempted a variety of jobs. He did not succeed as a truck driver due to poor sense of direction, and he lost his next job in the television industry. He got a job teaching art at Garland Junior College in Boston, but the college went bankrupt after a semester, leaving Brown unemployed. Meanwhile, his wife moved out of the house due to marital issues, eventually resulting in divorce. Around this time, Brown's 4-year-old son Tolon asked for a bedtime story about a weird animal, and Brown came up with the character of Arthur, an anthropomorphized aardvark. "I knew it couldn’t go on forever and ever. And 25 years seemed like a nice number", Brown said in an interview with Variety. Inspiration and reception Brown sees himself in all the characters, but especially Arthur. "I guess Arthur is most like me. Sometimes I really frighten myself when I look at a photo that was taken of me in the third grade. I’m wearing a bow tie just like Arthur." Brown credits artists like Marc Chagall and Maurice Sendak, author of Where the Wild Things Are, as influences. In a 2001 interview, Brown said he received about 100,000 letters a year from fans of Arthur, and he said that if children call his home and ask for Arthur, his wife replied that Arthur was "at the library". ==Personal life==

Brown married Stephanie Marini, a ballet dancer and college teacher, on September 1, 1968. They had two sons, Tolon and Tucker, before the marriage ended in divorce in 1977. On September 11, 1983, Brown married his second wife, Laurene Krasny, a writer and a psychologist at Harvard University. They had a daughter, Eliza. The names of Brown's children are hidden in the Arthur books' illustrations. Brown said in a 2003 interview, "I like to rise early, watch the sun rise over Hingham Harbor, and work". He worked at night sometimes, too, and typically focused on multiple projects at one time. ==Bibliography==