Lyn Gardner is a British

theatre critic Theatre criticism is a genre of arts criticism, and the act of writing or speaking about the performing arts such as a play or opera. Theatre criticism is distinct from drama criticism, as the latter is a division of literary criticism whereas t ...

, children's writer and

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalis ...

who contributes reviews and articles to ''

The Stage ''The Stage'' is a British weekly newspaper and website covering the entertainment industry and particularly theatre. It was founded in 1880. It contains news, reviews, opinion, features, and recruitment advertising, mainly directed at those wh ...

,'' '' Stagedoor'' and has written for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...

''.

Theatre critic and educator

A graduate in drama and English from the

University of Kent , motto_lang = , mottoeng = Literal translation: 'Whom to serve is to reign'(Book of Common Prayer translation: 'whose service is perfect freedom')Graham Martin, ''From Vision to Reality: the Making of the University of Kent at Canterbury'' ...

, Gardner was a founding member of the ''

City Limits City limits or city boundaries refer to the defined boundary or border of a city. The area within the city limit can be called the city proper. Town limit/boundary and village limit/boundary apply to towns and villages. Similarly, corporate li ...

'' magazine, a cooperative for which she edited the theatre section. Later, she was a contributor to ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

''. Gardner joined ''

'' as theatre critic in 1995, and remained on the paper for twenty-three years, taking a particular interest in

fringe Fringe may refer to: Arts * Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the world's largest arts festival, known as "the Fringe" * Adelaide Fringe, the world's second-largest annual arts festival * Fringe theatre, a name for alternative theatre * The Fringe, the ...

and more alternative theatre, while Michael Billington covered the most mainstream productions. Latterly she was writing 130 reviews and 28,000 words of features annually, as well as 150 posts a year for an online blog for the paper, begun in 2008. The paper discontinued her blog in 2017 citing cost pressures, and the following year let her go. Since June 2017 Gardner had been an Associate Editor of ''

'' newspaper, where she continues to write her theatre blog. Gardner was also taken on to teach an MA in Dramatic Writing at

Drama Centre London Drama Centre London (often abbreviated as Drama Centre) was a British drama school in King's Cross, London, where it moved in 2011 after a major reshaping of the University of the Arts London. It was part of Central Saint Martins, a constitue ...

Central Saint Martins Central Saint Martins is a public tertiary art school in London, England. It is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London. It offers full-time courses at foundation, undergraduate and postgraduate levels, and a variety of shor ...

Children's writer

Gardner is a writer of

children's novels Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. Modern children's literature is classified in two different ways: genre or the intended age of the reader. Children's ...

, the earliest being ''Into the Woods'' (2006) and ''Out of the Woods'' (2010), both illustrated by

Mini Grey Mini Grey is a British illustrator and writer of children's books, especially picture books for young children. She won the annual Kate Greenaway Medal from the professional librarians, recognising the year's best-illustrated children's book pub ...

and published by David Fickling Books. ISFDB catalogues it as the "Storm Eden" series. She has written six further children's novels for Nosy Crow, known as the "Stage School Series", base around a young girl named Olivia attending Stage School. They have been well received, and a final seventh book was published in July 2013. The first in the series was ''Olivia's First Term''.

References

External links

*
Lyn Gardner at Twitter
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gardner, Lyn Alumni of the University of Kent British children's writers British journalists British theatre critics Living people The Guardian journalists Year of birth missing (living people)

Theatre critic and educator

Children's writer

See also

References

External links