Ford Madox Ford was an English writer and critic, best known for his novel The Good Soldier, considered to be one of the greatest literary works of the 20th century; the Parade s End tetralogy, which was influenced by Ford s military service during the First World War; and The Fifth Queen trilogy, which chronicles the life of Henry VIII s ill-fated wife, Katherine Howard. As a critic, Ford championed new literature and literary experimentation, and his journals, The English Review and The Transatlantic Review, launched the careers of critically acclaimed authors like Thomas Hardy, Joseph Conrad, Henry James, D. H. Lawrence, and Ernest Hemingway. Ford died in 1939 at the age of 65.
Alexander Theroux is an award-winning novelist, poet and teacher whose prose works include Laura Warholic or, The Sexual Intellectual, Estonia, and the two artist monographs The Strange Case of Edward Gorey and The Enigma of Al Capp. His novel Darconville s Cat was chosen by Anthony Burgess as one of the 99 greatest post-war novels. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife Sarah-Son Theroux.