Muriel Spark was born in Edinburgh in 1918. A poet, essayist, biographer and novelist, she won much international praise, including being twice shortlisted for the Booker Prize. The Times placed her eighth in its list of the Fifty Greatest British Writers Since 1945. She died in Tuscany in 2006.Professor Dan Gunn joined the American University of Paris in 1989 after completing his doctoral work at the University of Sussex and four years of teaching in Paris. He is the founder and director of the AUP's Center for Writers & Translators, and is Editor of the Cahiers Series. He writes, publishes and reviews fiction. He is also the Paris director of the correspondence of Samuel Beckett, an international project based in Emory University.