Benedetto Croce (Italian pronunciation: [beneˈdetto ˈkroːtʃe]; February 25, 1866 – November 20, 1952) was an Italian idealist philosopher, and occasionally also politician. He wrote on numerous topics, including philosophy, history, methodology of history writing and aesthetics, and was a prominent liberal, although he opposed laissez-faire free trade. He had considerable influence on other prominent Italian intellectuals including both marxist Antonio Gramsci and fascist Giovanni Gentile.

Croce was born in Pescasseroli in the Abruzzo region of Italy. He came from an influential and wealthy family, and was raised in a very strict Catholic environment. Around the age of 16, he turned away from Catholicism and developed a personal view of spiritual life, in which religion cannot be anything but an historical institution where the creative strength of mankind can be expressed. He kept this position for the rest of his life.

In 1883, an earthquake hit the village of Casamicciola, Ischia island, near Naples, where he was on holiday with his family, destroying the home they lived in. His mother, father, and only sister were all killed, while he was buried for a very long time and barely survived. After the incident he inherited his family's fortune and much like Schopenhauer before him was able to live the rest of his life in relative leisure, enabling him to devote a great deal of time to philosophy as an independent intellectual writing from his palazzo in Naples. (Ryn, 2000:xi).

Mario Soldati (17 November 1906 – 19 June 1999) was an Italian writer and film director.

Soldati studied Humanities in his native city, Turin, and History of Art in Rome. He started publishing novels in 1929 although his fame came with America primo amore, published in 1935, a diary about the time he spent teaching at Columbia University. He won literary awards for the work, most notably the Strega Prize for Lettere da Capri in 1954.

He began directing in 1938 and his most famous films are Piccolo mondo antico (1941) and Malombra with Isa Miranda, both based on novels by Antonio Fogazzaro; these two films belong to the early 1940s movement in Italian cinema known as calligrafismo

Other popular films were Eugenie Grandet, based on Balzac's novel, with Alida Valli; Fuga in Francia (1948); The River Girl (starring Sophia Loren) and La provinciale (starring Gina Lollobrigida).

Soldati also wrote for Italian newspapers including Il Mondo, Il Corriere della Sera, La Stampa, Avanti, L'Unita and Il Giorno.

Roberto Saviano (Italian pronunciation: [roˈbɛrto saˈvjano]; born September 22, 1979) is an Italian writer and journalist.

In his writings, articles, television programs, and books he employs prose and news-reporting style to narrate the story of the Camorra (a powerful Neapolitan mafia-like organization), exposing its territory and business connections.

Since 2006, following the publication of his bestselling book Gomorrah (Gomorra in Italian), where he describes the clandestine particulars of the Camorra business, Saviano has been threatened by several Neapolitan "godfathers". The Italian Minister of the Interior has granted him a permanent police escort. Because of his courageous stance, he is considered a "national hero" by author-philosopher Umberto Eco. He lives at a secret location to avoid reprisal attacks for his book about the mafia, Gomorrah. Saviano was also accused by former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and also by many other ministers of defaming the country and being unpatriotic.