diff --git a/pkgs/development/interpreters/guile/1.9.nix b/pkgs/development/interpreters/guile/1.9.nix
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..963239f40da
--- /dev/null
+++ b/pkgs/development/interpreters/guile/1.9.nix
@@ -0,0 +1,45 @@
+{ fetchurl, stdenv, libtool, readline, gmp, pkgconfig, boehmgc, libunistring
+, gawk, makeWrapper }:
+
+stdenv.mkDerivation rec {
+  name = "guile-1.9.3";  # This is an alpha release!
+  src = fetchurl {
+    url = "ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/guile/${name}.tar.gz";
+    sha256 = "10q0k4884b68nba272bg1ym4djpvq35r9m8xw444mrh1jqfz9gsj";
+  };
+
+  buildInputs = [ makeWrapper gawk readline libtool libunistring pkgconfig ];
+  propagatedBuildInputs = [ gmp boehmgc ];
+
+  postInstall = ''
+    wrapProgram $out/bin/guile-snarf --prefix PATH : "${gawk}/bin"
+  '';
+
+  preBuild = ''
+    sed -e '/lt_dlinit/a  lt_dladdsearchdir("'$out/lib'");' -i libguile/dynl.c
+  '';
+
+  doCheck = true;
+
+  setupHook = ./setup-hook.sh;
+
+  meta = {
+    description = "GNU Guile 1.9 (alpha), an embeddable Scheme implementation";
+
+    longDescription = ''
+      GNU Guile is an implementation of the Scheme programming language, with
+      support for many SRFIs, packaged for use in a wide variety of
+      environments.  In addition to implementing the R5RS Scheme standard,
+      Guile includes a module system, full access to POSIX system calls,
+      networking support, multiple threads, dynamic linking, a foreign
+      function call interface, and powerful string processing.
+    '';
+
+    homepage = http://www.gnu.org/software/guile/;
+    license = "LGPLv3+";
+
+    maintainers = [ stdenv.lib.maintainers.ludo ];
+
+    platforms = stdenv.lib.platforms.all;
+  };
+}
diff --git a/pkgs/top-level/all-packages.nix b/pkgs/top-level/all-packages.nix
index 60bbf4ca2dc..0effbea6d48 100644
--- a/pkgs/top-level/all-packages.nix
+++ b/pkgs/top-level/all-packages.nix
@@ -2167,6 +2167,11 @@ let
     inherit fetchurl stdenv readline libtool gmp gawk makeWrapper;
   };
 
+  guile_1_9 = import ../development/interpreters/guile/1.9.nix {
+    inherit fetchurl stdenv readline libtool gmp gawk makeWrapper
+      libunistring pkgconfig boehmgc;
+  };
+
   io = builderDefsPackage (import ../development/interpreters/io) {
     inherit sqlite zlib gmp libffi cairo ncurses freetype mesa
       libpng libtiff libjpeg readline libsndfile libxml2