保罗·奥斯特，1947年出生于美国新泽西州纽瓦克市一个犹太裔中产阶级家庭，毕业于哥伦比亚大学。他被视为美国当代最勇于创新的小说家之一。

保罗·奥斯特年轻时过着漂泊无定的生活，不断尝试各种工作。一九七〇年至一九七四年，他客居巴黎，靠翻译法国文学为生。

保罗·奥斯特的主要作品有小说《布鲁克林的荒唐事》、《纽约三部曲》、《幻影书》等。曾获法国美第奇最佳外国小说奖、西班牙阿斯图里亚斯王储文学奖，作品被翻译成三十多种文字。他编剧的电影《烟》于一九九六年获得柏林电影节银熊奖和最佳编剧奖。

保罗·奥斯特现定居纽约布鲁克林区。

Nathan Glass has come to Brooklyn to die. Divorced, retired, estranged from his only daughter, the former life insurance salesman seeks only solitude and anonymity. Then Glass encounters his long-lost nephew, Tom Wood, who is working in a local bookstore--a far cry from the brilliant academic career Tom had begun when Nathan saw him last. Tom's boss is the colorful and charismatic Harry Brightman--a.k.a. Harry Dunkel--once the owner of a Chicago art gallery, whom fate has also brought to the "ancient kingdom of Brooklyn, New York." Through Tom and Harry, Nathan's world gradually broadens to include a new circle of acquaintances. He soon finds himself drawn into a scam involving a forged page of The Scarlet Letter, and begins to undertake his own literary venture, The Book of Human Folly, an account of "every blunder, every pratfall, every embarrassment, every idiocy, every foible, and every inane act I have committed during my long and checkered career as a man."

The Brooklyn Follies is Paul Auster's warmest, most exuberant novel, a moving, unforgettable hymn to the glories and mysteries of ordinary human life.