Thomas à Kempis was a Catholic theologian, mystic, canon, and writer of the Burgundian Netherlands who worked in both Latin and Dutch.

Born in Kempen around 1379 or 1380, he held the vocations of Catholic priest, regular priest, and canon across the course of his life. He died in Zwolle in 1471, with the more precisely dated sources pointing to the third of August of that year.

Among the works attributed to him are the Alphabetum monachi and The Imitation of Christ. These two texts represent the written record that the facts preserve of his output as an author and poet. His use of both Latin and Dutch marks him as a writer who moved between more than one linguistic register in his work.

His overlapping identities as philosopher, mystic, theologian, and poet suggest a figure whose writing life was not confined to a single mode or discipline. The Imitation of Christ stands as the most concretely attested work connected to his name, and it is that text, alongside the Alphabetum monachi, that the surviving record places at the center of his activity as a writer.