Dick King-Smith, 1922-2011.
In an interview he once described his typical day as "sit down in my very small study in my very old (from 1635) cottage; scribble in longhand in the morning; in the afternoon, type out the morning's work (on an old portable typewriter, with one finger); evening, read day's work to my wife, seeking her approval."
Like Kipling, King-Smith did not gloss over the brutality of nature; he created an unsentimental animal world. He never “pussyfooted on death”, as he later commented about himself.