Garth Ennis

Garth Ennis
Garth Ennis, February 2009
Born	(1970-01-16) 16 January 1970 (age 47) Holywood, County Down, Northern Ireland
Nationality	American
Area(s)	Writer
Notable works	Preacher The Boys Judge Dredd Hellblazer Punisher Dan Dare Just a Pilgrim Hitman
Awards	1998: Best Writer Eisner Award

Garth Ennis (born 16 January 1970) is a Northern Irish-born American comics writer, best known for the Vertigo series Preacher with artist Steve Dillon and his successful nine-year run on Marvel Comics' Punisher franchise. He has collaborated with artists such as Dillon and Glenn Fabry on Preacher, John McCrea on Hitman, and Carlos Ezquerra on both Preacher and Hitman.

Ennis began his comic-writing career in 1989 with the series Troubled Souls. Appearing in the short-lived but critically acclaimed British anthology Crisis and illustrated by John McCrea, it told the story of a young, Protestant man caught up by fate in the violence of the Irish 'Troubles'. It spawned a sequel, For a Few Troubles More, a broad Belfast-based comedy featuring two supporting characters from Troubled Souls, Dougie and Ivor, who would later get their own American comics series, Dicks, from Caliber in 1997, and several follow-ups from Avatar. Ennis was later critical of his writing debut, which he describes as "the kind of thing that was doing well at the time. (...) With hindsight, what Troubled Souls really represented was naked ambition. It was a direct attempt to get published. And that was the road that seemed most likely to lead me to success".

Another series for Crisis was True Faith, a religious satire inspired by his schooldays, this time drawn by Warren Pleece. Like the two Troubles stories it was collected as a graphic novel in 1990, but religious protests led to it being quickly withdrawn from sale, apparently on the orders of publisher Robert Maxwell. It was later republished in 1997 by Vertigo.