Alan Warner

Alan Warner (born 1964) is a Scottish novelist who grew up in Connel, near Oban. He is best known for his novels Morvern Callar, The Sopranos (1998) and its sequel The Stars in the Bright Sky (2010). Morvern Callar and The Sopranos were both adapted into films, while the latter was also adapted for stage.

Early life Warner's father, Frank Warner, was a Yorkshireman who served in World War Two. Warner's parents ran a coal delivery business in Mull, a shop in Kilchoan, and a small hotel in Oban, before in 1963 buying the 42-bedroom Marine Hotel, close to Oban ferry terminal. They were both in their forties when he was born. Around 1982 Warner's parents sold the hotel and retired to Spain.

He attended Oban High School and left it at sixteen years old, after which he started working on the railways as a shunter.

Novels and other fiction Warner's debut novel, the critically acclaimed Morvern Callar (1995), won a Somerset Maugham Award. It was followed by a sequel, These Demented Lands (1997), which won the Encore Award. His third novel The Sopranos (1998) won the Saltire Society's Scottish Book of the Year Award.

His novella After the Vision appeared in the anthology Children of Albion Rovers (1997), and his short story "Bitter Salvage" was included in Disco Biscuits (1997), an anthology edited by Sarah Champion.

Adaptations of his work Morvern Callar has been adapted as a film, directed by Lynne Ramsay and released in 2002. The Sopranos has been adapted for the screen by Alan Sharp and Michael Caton-Jones. Released under the title Our Ladies in 2019, it was directed by Caton-Jones.

A play by Lee Hall, Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour, was based on The Sopranos and premiered in 2015, directed by Vicky Featherstone and featuring live songs.

Recurring motifs and influences Multiple of Warner's novels are set in "The Port", a fictionalized version of Oban. In 2021 Warner shared that he was selected by Schmidt and Mute Records to listen to 120 hours of live performances and help select the best ones to be released as live albums. As of November 2024 the series has reached six releases of recordings of different live shows played from 1973 to 1977.

Warner has been deeply influenced by existentialist fiction such as that of Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. In an interview with Zoë Strachan Warner shared how novels such as The Stranger and Nausea have shaped Morvern Callar. Another book Warner noted as leaving "a strong impact" on him was Alan Paton's Cry, the Beloved Country. He later went on to mention James Kelman, Samuel Beckett, Ian McDiarmid as strong influences, especially but not limited to his use of Scots in his books and what he referred to as writing "anti-novels". In 2019, he became senior lecturer in creative writing at the University of Aberdeen.

He was a member of the jury for the 2016 Scotiabank Giller Prize.

Warner is a supporter of Scottish independence. He is married and met his wife Holly in Spain.

Works Novels 1995 – Morvern Callar 1997 – These Demented Lands 1998 – The Sopranos 2002 – The Man Who Walks 2006 – The Worms Can Carry Me To Heaven 2010 – The Stars in the Bright Sky 2012 – The Deadman's Pedal 2014 – Their Lips Talk of Mischief 2021 – Kitchenly 434 2023 – Nothing Left to Fear from Hell

Short story collections 2020 – The Seal Club (co-written with Irvine Welsh and John King) 2023 – Seal Club 2: The View From Poacher's Hill (co-written with Irvine Welsh and John King)

Non-fiction 2015 – Tago Mago: Permission to Dream

Music 1998 – Superstar Vs Alan Warner EP (A collaboration with Scottish band Superstar)

Acclaim and awards Warner's first three novels all won awards, notably a Somerset Maugham Award for Morvern Callar. In 2010, his novel The Stars in the Bright Sky was included in the longlist for the Man Booker Prize. In 2013, he was awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his novel The Deadman's Pedal. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature the same year.

Warner's literary archive is held at the National Library of Scotland.