Andrea Marcolongo is an Italian journalist, writer, Classics scholar, and former speech writer for Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. The Ingenious Language was a bestseller in Italy and in many of the other dozen countries in which it has been published. She is also the author of The Heroic Measure. She lives in Paris, France.

Will Schutt is the author of Westerly, selected by Carl Phillips for the Yale Series of Younger Poets. He is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Translation Fellowship. He currently lives with his wife in Prato, Italy, where he works as an independent writing tutor, literary consultant, and translator.