Leslie Aaron Fiedler was born March 8, 1917 in Newark, New Jersey. Fiedler left Newark as soon as he could and ventured north to pursue his education. After receiving his B.A. from New York University in 1938, Fiedler pursued graduate studies in English at the University of Wisconsin where he received both his M.A. and Ph.D.

Fiedler's first academic position was at Montana State University, Missoula, where he was hired as an assistant professor in 1941. In 1963 he transferred to the State University of New York at Buffalo where he remained for the duration of his career.

From 1974 to 1977, Fiedler served as chair of the University's Department of English. He was promoted to SUNY Distinguished Professor in 1987 and in 1989 he received the Chancellor Charles P. Norton Medal, the highest award given by UB. Fiedler held the department's prestigious Samuel L. Clemens Chair for thirty years. After his death in 2003, the position was renamed the Leslie A. Fiedler Chair.

Irving J. Weiss was born September 11, 1921 in New York City to Rose and Max Weiss. During the Second World War, Weiss served in the U.S. Army, 1941-1945. Weiss was a poet and translator who taught at Pennsylvania State University, The Fashion Institute of Technology, an American Dependents School in Naples, Italy, and SUNY New Paltz over the course of his career.

Recognized for his visual poetry, Weiss was known for “Visual Voices: The Poem As a Print Object,” as well as collections of his visual poems “Number Poems,” “Infrapics,” and “Identities.” Weiss was also the authorized translator of “Sens-Plastique,” a collection of over two-thousand original aphorisms and pensées of writer and painter Malcolm de Chazal. Weiss also compiled and edited a reference book, “Reflections on Childhood,” with his wife, Anne D. Weiss (1926-2000), consisting of passages from classical and biblical writings on childhood.

Notably, Weiss met Leslie A. Fiedler in the 1950s while living on the island of Ishia, Italy, which was well known for an English ex-pat community at the time. The two maintained a friendship for many years and corresponded on occasion.

Weiss died June 13, 2021 in Dix Hills, New York.

Information in the biographical note was provided by Piera Weiss, daughter of Irving Weiss.