Showing results by author "Lord Dunsany" in All Categories

The Book of Wonder is one of the most important books in the lineage of fantasy fiction. It introduced themes that Lord Dunsany worked with for the rest of his career, which created tropes that you'll recognise as if you've read and loved this book many times before.

Written in the dark days of World War I, join Lord Dunsany as he spreads the dreams that we cannot leave to die. Dunsany was the most influential writer in the genre that came to be known as fantasy, which his stories set trends for that continue to this day.

A fun adventure in a Spain that never was, in the vein of Dumas and Stevenson, with more than a taste of Cervantes. Don Rodriguez is a young nobleman who is banished from the family castle, and must set out with his rapier and mandolin to win his own estate, and perhaps even a bride. Along with his trusty servant Morano, he journeys far into the heart of the mythical Shadow Valley. Echoes of The Princess Bride resonate throughout.

Lord Dunsany was the most influential writer in the genre that came to be known as fantasy, of which his stories set trends for that continue to this day.

This was the book that launched a genre. Modern fantasy collections trace their lineage back to Lord Dunsany, and this was his first work that today's listeners would recognise in tone and settings.

Fifty-One Tales is a collection of fantasy short stories by Irish writer Lord Dunsany, a major influence on J. R. R. Tolkien, H. P. Lovecraft, Ursula K. Le Guin and others. Each story is a short vignette, a single moment of strangeness or horror in the face of death.

The great fantasy writer Lord Dunsany wrote very little in the way of fantasy after the onset of the First World War. This was partly because he was busy, having volunteered in 1915 and becoming a Captain in the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers in Derry. However, the reality of the world bore in on our hero at this time, and it is not difficult to imagine that his heart moved to more serious concerns. Dunsany’s days of high fantasy, it seems, ended with the emergence of civil unrest in his nation.

Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett was born into a very unusual situation in 1878. He was the eldest scion of a family that had lived in the oldest castle in Ireland since its construction in 1180 CE, and became the 18th Baron Dunsany in 1899 at the age of 21, when his father passed away. He was a soldier, lord, military trainer, propaganda writer, activist, and invented Dunsany’s Chess, in which one player has four ranks of pawns and no other pieces. He published mostly first drafts, writing short stories, fantasy novels, plays, and poems, with over 90 publications in his lifetime.