Contributors

Neil M. Gunn was a Scottish novelist, critic and dramatist. Born in the northernmost county of mainland Scotland in 1891, he began his career as a customs and excise officer and spent sixteen years working at the Glen Mhor Whisky Distillery. He wrote prolifically throughout his life, authoring over twenty novels, essays and works of non-fiction. In 1937 he won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his novel Highland River. Gunn is regarded as one of the most important Scottish authors of the early twentieth century and a leading light of the 'Scottish Renaissance' of the 1920s and 30s. He died in 1973.

Frode Grytten is a Norwegian writer and journalist. He is the author of the Brage Prize-winning novels Beehive Song and The Day Nils Vik Died (translated into the English as The Ferryman and his Wife), as well as several short story collections and two children's books.

Deborah Gruenfeld has been a professor of social psychology at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. She has a masters in journalism from NYU and a PhD in psychology from the University of Illinois and began her academic career at Northwestern before being recruited to Stanford. Widely published in her field, she is a frequent keynote and featured speaker at executive conferences and internal events at large corporations.

Stephanie Gruner Buckley is a writer in London. She previously worked as the Europe Editor for Quartz, as a staff reporter for The Wall Street Journal in Europe and as a staff writer at Inc. magazine. Her stories have also appeared in the New York Times magazine and The Sunday Times of London. She teaches investigative journalism, business and economic reporting, and ethics to reporters in economically developing countries.

Peter Guber has had an extraordinarily varied and successful career, serving as Studio Chief at Columbia Pictures; CEO of Polygram Entertainment; Chairman and CEO of Sony Pictures; and Chairman and CEO of his current venture, Mandalay Entertainment Group. Among the award-winning films he has produced or executive produced (which have garnered more than fifty Oscar nominations) are The Color Purple, Batman, and Rain Man. Guber is also Chairman of Dick Clark Productions, which produces the American Music Awards, Golden Globe Awards, and other programs. He is a professor at the UCLA School of Theater Film and Television and the Anderson School of Management and an Entertainment and Media Analyst for Fox Business News.

Stanislav Grof is an internationally acclaimed researcher of the transformative potential of non-ordinary states of consciousness. He is a founder of Transpersonal Psychology, and teaches at the California Institute of Integral Studies.

Earl A. Grollman is an internationally acclaimed Rabbi and bereavement counsellor. Among his numerous awards he has received the Distinguished Human Service Award from Yeshiva University.

Andrew S. Grove was the CEO of Intel, and the company's third employee. An early titan of Silicon Valley, he was 'idolized' by Steve Jobs, transformed Intel into the world's largest computer chip maker and helped shape the world of computing. Having immigrated from Hungary to the US aged 20, he would go on to amass a personal fortune, and to write books on management – including High Output Management – that continue to influence leaders like Mark Zuckerberg and Ben Horowitz today.

Tim S. Grover is the preeminent authority on the science and art of achieving physical and mental dominance. Since 1989, he has been the CEO of Attack Athletics, appearing around the world as a keynote speaker and consultant to business leaders, athletes, and elite achievers in any area who want to know how the best can get better in anything they do, teaching the principles of relentless drive, result-driven performance, and mental toughness. A featured columnist at SI.com and Yahoo.com, he also appears regularly on ESPN and other media outlets. He is the author of the national bestseller Relentless: From Good to Great to Unstoppable and creator of digital training platform "The Relentless System." He is based in Chicago.

John Howard Griffin was born in Texas in 1920. As a student in France in 1939 he was caught up with the outbreak of the Second World War, and worked with the French Resistance before joining the US Army. Hit by shrapnel in an air raid, he lost his sight; a bout of spinal malaria in 1955 led to the paralysis of his lower body, but remarkably he regained both his sight and the use of his legs two years later. After the publication of Black Like Me he worked as a human rights activist, and taught at the University of Peace. He died in 1980.

Kate Griffin studied English literature at university and developed a healthy obsession with Victorian gothic novels. She has worked as an assistant to an antiques dealer, a journalist for local newspapers and for the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings. Kitty Peck and the Music Hall Murders, Kate's first book, won the Stylist/Faber crime writing competition. She is also the author of three subsequent Kitty Peck novels; a gothic standalone, Fyneshade and the co-author of the forthcoming The Blackbirds of St Giles with Marcia Hutchinson, under the pseudonym Lila Cain. Kate lives in St Albans.