This article concerns the American literary novelist John C. Gardner. For other men with this name, see John Gardner (disambiguation).

John Champlin Gardner, Jr. (July 21, 1933 – September 14, 1982) was an American novelist and teacher. He was born in 1933 in Batavia, New York. He was a popular and controversial figure until his death in a motorcycle accident in 1982.

Gardner's father was a lay-preacher and dairy farmer and his mother was an English teacher at a local school. Both parents were fond of Shakespeare, and often recited literature together. As a child, Gardner attended public school and worked on his father's farm, where he accidentally killed his brother in an accident with a cultipacker.

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NPR Topics: Authors

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