Alan Paton was born on January 11, 1903 in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. Paton became a science teacher in 1925, the start of a varied career, which ran parallel to his writing. He died in 1988.

A beautiful novel, rich, firm and moving-its writing is so fresh, its projection of character so immediate and full, its events so compelling and its understanding so compassionate, that to read the book is to share intimately, even to the point of catharsis, in the grave human experience treated.