Robert Peters is a poet, critic, playwright, fiction writer, actor, and editor, retired from many years of teaching literature at the University of California, Irvine. His two earlier memoirs, Crunching Gravel: A Wisconsin Boyhood in the Thirties, and Nell's Story: A Woman from Eagle River, written with his sister, are both published by the University of Wisconsin Press. His many volumes of poetry include Poems: Selected and New (1967–1991) and Love Poems for Robert Mitchum.