Eugene Field was born in 1850 in Saint Louis and died in 1895, at the age of forty-five, in Chicago. Famous for his children's texts (he himself had eight children), his poems continue to be read even today in many homes and schools in the United States. Eugene was a renowned journalist, specializing in columns and chronicles full of humor and customs details. Upon the first publication of The Loves of a Bibliomaniac, his brother Roswell wrote these words: “He was an indefatigable collector of books, and he owned a library as valuable as it was interesting, containing volumes obtained only at the cost of great personal sacrifice, so he understood perfectly well that disorder called bibliomania, and knew the half tragic, half humorous aspect of this incurable disease. The journalistic column that he wrote almost daily for twelve years often included rogue mischief and affectionate taunts against those of his unhappy compatriots who, through him, had become famous for their devotion to old bookshelves and auctions.