Christopher Vernon Hassall, 1912-1963, was born in London, England, on 24 March 1912. After he graduated from Wadham College, Oxford, he started working as an understudy to actor Ivor Novello, 1893-1951. Hassall and Novello began collaborating and created several hit musicals. A prolific writer, Hassall worked in several different modes and completed a number of scripts, screenplays, songs, librettos, poems, and biographies. He died in Rochester, England, on 25 April 1963.

Ronald Fuller, 1904-1974, studied English literature at Merton College, Oxford, in the 1920s and went on to become a writer and literary critic. A conscientious objector during World War II, Fuller served as an ambulance driver during the London Blitz. Fuller regularly contributed to the Poetry Review and reviewed Hassall's work for the journal in the 1930s. Fuller published the following books over the course of his career: The Saga of Form (1929), Literary Craftsmanship and Appreciation (1934), Beggar's Brotherhood (1936), Hell-Fire Francis (1939), Honey of Sweet Days (1939), The Story of the Pilgrim's Progress (1951), William Morris (1956), and The Work of Rex Whistler (1960).