John Prendergast was born in Philadelphia. He attended the University of Pennsylvania for his B.A., majoring in English. For several years after graduation, Prendergast worked as writer and editor for the University of Pennsylvania and Thomas Jefferson University, a medical school in Philadelphia. In 1988, he earned his M.A. through the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University, studying with John Barth and Stephen Dixon. He became Managing Editor of Civil Engineering magazine in 1989, and lived in New York City with his wife, poet Carole Bernstein, until 1996, when he became the editor of The Pennsylvania Gazette.