Lord Dunsany was an aristocrat, a soldier, a sportsman, an avid chess player, and an author. He wrote many things, both in terms of genre--poems, plays, stories, novels, and essays--and in quantity. Such a varied and prolific career was typical of many British writers between the world wars, but since that period Dunsany has been singled out for that portion of his vast output devoted to the fantastic.

He was born Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett on 24 July 1878 near Regent's Park in London. His early upbringing, however, was that of the English country house--specifically Dunstall Priory near Sevenoaks in Kent. There he first developed the love of the countryside that he retained throughout his life. This fondness for the outdoors was further developed after his grandfather died; his father became the seventeenth Baron Dunsany in 1889, and the family began to divide its time between Dunstall Priory and Dunsany...