Don Marquis was considered by many to be the successor to Mark Twain as America's foremost wit. He was a daily newspaper columnist for the New York Sun and, later, the Herald Tribune. He invented a great many characters to express his and their opinions on the issues of the day, partly in order to fulfillthe constant need for material to fill his column. Two of his most memorable and much-loved characters are Archy the Cockroach and Mehitabel the Alley Cat (the pair who, together, make up the Bloodaxe titles Archyology i and ii), who now, over half a century after Marquis' death, are still able to endure.