David Heatley was born in Teaneck, New Jersey. He graduated from Oberlin College with a double degree in art and psychology in 1997, and got his MFA in film from the San Francisco Art Institute in 2000. He started making comics in the late 1990s, and has contributed to The New Yorker, The New York Times, McSweeney's, Mome and Kramers Ergot. His solo comic book series 'Deadpan' was published by Fantagraphics, and his full-length graphic novel 'My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down' was published by Pantheon Books in 2008.