Carlo Collodi

Carlo Collodi is the pen-name of Carlo Lorenzini who lived from 1826 to 1890. Collodi is the name of the little village in Tuscany, Italy, where his mother was born. Carlo was born in Florence, the son of a cook and a servant, and spent most of his childhood in the rough and tumble of the streets rather than in the classroom. This could have helped when twice he was called upon to be a soldier. He began his writing career in newspapers and started his own satirical paper Il Lampione (The Lantern). By the 1950s he was publishing fiction and non-fiction titles and soon decided to concentrate on writing for children because, “adults are too hard to please”.

(http://www.puffin.co.uk/nf/Author/AuthorPage/0,,1000002510,00.html)