普裏莫·萊維 (Primo Levi，1919—1987) 意大利最重要的作傢、化學傢以及奧斯維辛174517號囚犯，這兩種身份與經曆建立瞭他寫作的基礎。 萊維1919年齣生於意大利都靈，1944年因參與反法西斯運動被捕，後被遣送至奧斯維辛集中營。戰爭結束後，他迴到故 鄉都靈生活。1987年自殺身亡。他的作品曾被選入意大利語文教材，涉及詩歌、小說、迴憶錄等各個領域。著有《活在奧斯維辛》（Survival in Auschwitz）、《再度覺醒》(The Reawakening)、《緩刑時刻》(Moments of Reprieve)、《元素周期錶》(The Periodic Table)、《如果不是現在，那麼何時？》(If Not Now, When?)、《猴子的憂傷》(The Monkey’s Wrench)等。《被淹沒和被拯救的》（The Drowned and the Saved）是他生前完成的最後一部著作。

Shortly after completing THE DROWNED AND THE SAVED, Primo Levi committed suicide. The matter of his death was sudden, violent and unpremiditated, and there were some who argue that he killed himself because he was tormented by guilt - guilt that he had survived the horrors of Auschwitz while others, better than he, had gone to the wall. THE DROWNED AND THE SAVED is Levi's impassioned attempt to understand the 'rationale' behind the concentration camps, was completed shortly before his tragic death in 1987. THE DROWNED AND THE SAVED dispels the myth that Primo Levi forgave the Germans for what they did to his people. He didn't and couldn't forgive. He refused, however, to indulge in what he called 'the bestial vice of hatred' which is an entirely different matter. The voice that sounds in his writing is that of a reasonable man...it warns and reminds us that the unimaginable can happen again. A would-be tyrant is waiting in the wings, with 'beautiful words' on his lips. The book is constantly impressing on us the need to learn from the past, to make sense of the senseless' PAUL BAILEY