Leslie Poles Hartley was born in Cambridgeshire in 1895, and was educated first at Harrow and then Oxford. His career as a writer began with short stories (his first collection Night Fears was published in 1924) and ran alongside his work as a prolific and highly regarded reviewer of fiction, writing for such magazines as the Spectator and the Sketch. His first full-length novel was to be The Shrimp and the Anemone (1944) and was followed by a succession of novels, including The Hireling (1957) and his final work Love-Adept (1969). While the majority of L. P. Hartley's work is now, sadly, out of print, The Go-Between remains the most enduringly popular and timeless of his novels, rightfully claiming its place as a classic.