Graham Colin Swift FRSL is a renowned British author, born on May 4, 1949, in London, UK. He was educated at Dulwich College, Queens' College, Cambridge, and the University of York.

Swift has authored more than ten novels, which have been translated into over thirty languages. His notable work, Waterland, received the Guardian Fiction Prize in 1983. In 1984, he became a member of the prestigious Royal Society of Literature.

Several of his works have been adapted into films, including Last Orders, starring Michael Caine and Bob Hoskins, which won the Booker Prize in 1996 despite some controversy over its similarities to William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying.

Swift's Waterland is often cited as one of his best novels, noted for its exploration of landscape, history, and family.