Tzvetan Todorov is a Bulgarian-French historian, philosopher, literary critic, sociologist and essayist. He is the author of many books and essays, which have a significant influence in anthropology, sociology, semiotics, literary theory, thought history and culture theory.

Todorov has published a total of 21 books, including The Poetics of Prose (1971), Introduction to Poetics (1981), The Conquest of America (1982), Mikhail Bakhtin: The Dialogical Principle (1984), Facing the Extreme: Moral Life in the Concentration Camps (1991), On Human Diversity (1993), Hope and Memory (2000), and Imperfect Garden: The Legacy of Humanism (2002). Todorov's historical interests have focused on such crucial issues as the conquest of The Americas and the Nazi and Stalinist concentration camps.