Thomas William Shapcott was born in Ipswich, Queensland, on 21 March 1935. He attended the Ipswich Grammar School with his twin brother, John Arthur (Jack). Shapcott left school at fifteen to work in his father's accountancy business. In 1954 Shapcott began to write poetry seriously for the first time. His first published poem appeared in the Sydney Bulletin in 1956. His first collection of poems, Time on fire won the Grace Leven Poetry Prize for 1961. That same year he completed an accountancy degree at the University of Queensland, then completed a Bachelor of Arts in 1967. In 1971, Shapcott was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to visit America, a trip which led to the autobiographical poems in Shabbytown calendar (1975). He established an accountancy firm in 1972, having gained previous accountancy experience working with his father's accountancy firm. In 1973, he was appointed to the Literature Board of the Australia Council and served as its Director from 1983 to 1990. He served as the Executive Director of the National Book Council from 1991 to 1997, when he became the inaugural Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Adelaide, retiring from the position in 2005. As well as his many volumes of poetry, Shapcott has written many novels, short stories, libretti, plays and reviews. He has received numerous awards for his contribution to Australian literature, including the Canada-Australia Literary Award in 1978, the Yugoslavia Struga International Poetry Festival Golden Wreath Award in 1989, the FAW Christopher Brennan Award in 1995, the New South Wales Premier’s Special Literary Award in 1996, and the Patrick White Award in 2000. In 1989, he was made an Officer of the Order of Australia. He has received honorary Doctorates from Macquarie University (1989) and the University of Queensland (2009).

Judith Catherine Green was born on 13 February 1936 in Perth, Western Australia. She attended the Ascot State School and Brisbane Girls' Grammar School. She won an Open Scholarship to the University of Queensland where she obtained First Class Honours in English. In 1965, she received her Master of Arts from Cambridge University. She met her first husband, Fabio Rodriguez while tutoring at Kingston University in Jamaica. They married in 1964 and divorced in 1981. In 1982 she married Thomas Shapcott. She published numerous volumes of poetry, some illustrated by her own woodcuts. From 1979 to 1982 she was poetry editor for Meanjin and from 1988 to 1997 a poetry editor with Penguin Australia. Judith Rodriguez has also co-written the play Poor Johanna with Robyn Archer and her libretto for the opera Lindy was performed at the Sydney Opera House in 2002. She is the recipient of numerous awards including the Christopher Brennan Award and in 1994 received the Order of Australia for services to literature. Rodriguez died on 22 November 2018.