Peter Gay was a Sterling Professor of History, emeritus, at Yale University, the author of more than 30 widely respected books, and the winner of the National Book Award for The Rise of Modern Paganism , the first volume of his definitive work on the Enlightenment. Gay is also the author of Why the Romantics Matter, Modernism: The Lure of Heresy: from Baudelaire to Beckett and Beyond, Schnitzler's Century and many other titles.