Judith Ann Cutler Bagai (1936-2008) was born in Chicago, Illinois. She received her bachelor's degree from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1965, and did doctoral work in English at University of California Los Angeles and Columbia. She taught at California State University, Los Angeles, and created and hosted the KPFK radio show "The Drop Out University of the Air." She was a poet and published in many literary magazines in the 1950s. Having joined the National Puzzlers' League in 1987, she served as its editor from 1989 to 1996 under the nom de plume "Sibyl."

Judith was married to Sam Eisenstein, a Jungian psychologist, from 1953 to 1957, and to Eric Bagai, a publisher, from 1968 until her death at the age of 72. They had one son, Jeremy, born in 1969.

Judith was friends with many artists and became good friends with Theodore Sturgeon in the 1960s. Sturgeon was once a guest speaker in her class on Contemporary Literature at California State University, Los Angeles, and several times served as a guest on her radio show. In 1968, Judith, Ted, and Eric appeared together on a panel at the American Psychological Association to discuss whether the "Hippie Movement" was a social phenomenon or social disorder. Sturgeon's 1971 short story collection Sturgeon is Alive and Well is dedicated: "To Judith Eisenstein Bagai, who keeps the faith."