Dunsany, Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett (1878–1957)

Irish writer. Born in London, he was educated at Sandhurst military college, and succeeded to his family's estate in County Meath in 1899. He was the author of a series of stories, beginning with The Travel Tales of Mr Joseph Jorkens (1931), which employed the convention of a narrator (Jorkens) sitting in a club or bar. He also wrote short ironic heroic fantasies, collected in The Gods of Pegana (1905) and other books. His first play was The Glittering Gate (1909).

His novels include Time and the Gods (1906), The King of Elfland's Daughter (1924), and The Wise Woman (1933). The Glittering Gate was performed at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin; others among his numerous plays are The Golden Doom (1912), A Night at an Inn (1916), The Laughter of the Gods (1919), Alexander (1925), Mr Faithful (1927), The Old Folk of the Centuries (1930), Lord Adrian (1933), and Plays for Earth and Air (1937). These plays are intellectual dreams, immersed in a personal mythological world.

He also published two volumes of verse, Fifty Poems (1930) and Mirage Water (1939), and a series of autobiographical works.

Dunsany served as a member of the Coldstream Guards in the Boer War and in World War I.