Taghi Modarressi was born in Iran and educated as a doctor. He continued his education in the United States and became a member of the Department of Psychiatry of the University of Maryland School of Medicine. He is the author of The Book of Absent People and The Pilgrim’s Rules of Etiquette. He was married to the novelist Anne Tyler.

Nasrin Rahimieh is Howard Baskerville Professor of Humanities in the Department of Comparative Literature and Associate Dean for Academic Personnel in the School of Humanities at University of California, Irvine. She is the editor-in-chief of the journal, Iranian Studies. She is the author of several books including Missing Persians: Discovering Voices in Iranian Cultural History.