Carlo Collodi, whose real name was Carlo Lorenzini, was an Italian writer and journalist from Florence. He took his pen name from Collodi, the small Tuscan village where his mother was born.

He first published The Adventures of Pinocchio in instalments in a children's magazine from 1881 to 1883. The story of the wooden puppet who wants to become a real boy became one of the most translated books in the world. He wrote in Italian; the book here is in an early English translation.