Born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1916, Walker Percy was trained as a physician at Columbia University. After a year's internship at Bellevue Hospital in New York, he contracted tuberculosis and abandoned medicine for a literary career. His first novel, The Moviegoer, was awarded the 1962 National Book Award for Fiction. His other books include the novels The Last Gentleman, Love in the Ruins, and The Thanatos Syndrome as well as the collection of essays The Message in the Bottle. Percy died in Covington, Louisiana, in 1990.

Paul Elie is a senior fellow at Georgetown University's Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs. His first book, The Life You Save May Be Your Own, received the PEN/Martha Albrand Prize and was a National Book Critics Circle award finalist in 2003. He is also the author of Reinventing Bach, a finalist for National Book Critics Circle award in 2012. He lives in New York City.