Mark Caldwell was born in Troy, New York, and educated at Fordham, Cambridge, and Harvard universities. He is currently a professor of English at Fordham University, and specializes in Renaissance literature and American cultural history.

His books include The Last Crusade: The War on Consumption, 1862-1954 (a study of tuberculosis and its effecton American life before the invention antibiotics effective against the disease) and A Short History of Rudeness: Manners, Morals, and Misbehavior in Modern America (1999). His most recent book, New York Night: The Mystique and Its History, won a New York Magazine culture award as the best New York book of 2005.

He has written for the Village Voice, 7 Days, Discover magazine, The New York Times, and the Philadelphia Inquirer. He lives in Manhattan and the Hudson valley.