Michael D. Richardson was born on March 15, 1970 in Hackensack, New Jersey. He graduated from Stanford University with a B. A. in German Studies in 1992 and received his PhD. in German Studies from Cornell University in 2001. Since 1998, he has been an Assistant Professor of German in the Department of Modern Languages at Ithaca College. He has written and presented on contemporary German film and literature, as well as the theater of Heiner Muller. He is currently working on a book length study of American representations of Hitler and the Nazis.