Robert Lax (1915–2000) was born in Olean, New York. At Columbia University he studied with Mark Van Doren and there began friendships with his classmates Thomas Merton and the painter Ad Reinhardt. He then worked as a university lecturer, film critic, script writer, and editor at the New Yorker. In 1962 he moved to the Greek islands, where he spent most of the last four decades of his life.