Peter Conrad was born in Australia, and since 1973, has taught English at Christ Church, Oxford. He has written numerous works of criticism, including Imagining America, The Everyman History of English Literature, A Song of Love and Death: The Meaning of Opera, Modern Times, Modern Places: A Cultural History of the 20th Century and The Hitchcock Murders. He has also written two autobiographical works, Down Home and Where I Fell to Earth, and in 1992, he published his first novel, Underworld.