Alan Bennett born 9 May 1934 is an English playwright screenwriter and author Born in Leeds he attended Oxford University where he studied history and performed with The Oxford Revue He stayed to teach and research medieval history at the university for several years His collaboration as writer and performer with Dudley Moore Jonathan Miller and Peter Cook in the satirical revue Beyond the Fringe at the 1960 Edinburgh Festival brought him instant fame He gave up academia and turned to writing full time his first stage play Forty Years On being produced in 1968 His output includes The Madness of George III and its film incarnation The Madness of King George the series of monologues Talking Heads the play The History Boys and popular audio books including his readings of Alices Adventures in Wonderland and WinniethePooh Description above from the Wikipedia article Alan Bennett licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia