Ernst van Alphen is hoogleraar literatuurwetenschap aan de universiteit van Leiden. Hij publiceerde onder meer Francis Bacon and the Loss of Self (Harvard University Press, Cambridge/London, 1993), Caught by History: Holocaust Effects in Contemporary Art, Literature, and Theory (Stanford University Press, Palo Alto, 1997), Armando: Shaping Memory (NAi Publishers, Rotterdam, 2000), and Art in Mind: How Contemporary Images Shape Thought (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2005).