Sigrid Undset (1882-1949) began her writing career while working as a secretary to support her mother and sisters. The publication of her first novel allowed her to abandon office work, and she left her native Norway for Rome, where she eventually married a Norwegian painter. Jenny, originally published in Norway in 1911, marked Undset's breakthrough as a writer. A few years later, her marriage ended and she withdrew to rural Norway, where she began work on her medieval trilogy, Kristin Lavransdatter. She won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1928.

Tiina Nunnally is the award-winning translator of more than seventy books from the Scandinavian languages, including Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset, Niels Lyhne by Jens Peter Jacobsen and The Land of Dreams by Vidar Sundstøl. She was appointed a Knight of the Royal Norwegian Order of Merit for her contributions to Norwegian literature in the United States.