Biography

Amory, Mark. Lord Dunsany: A Biography. London: William Collins Sons & Co., 1972, 288 p.

Surveys Dunsany's life and career.

Bierstadt, Edward Hale. Dunsany the Dramatist. Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1919, 244 p.

Overview of Dunsany's career; includes the reminiscences of his friends and colleagues, his letters and speeches, and his own reflections.

Criticism

Chislett, William, Jr. "New Gods for Old" and "Lord Dunsany: Amateur and Artist." In his Moderns and Near Moderns, pp. 171-80; pp. 181-88. Reprint. Freeport, N.Y.: Books for Libraries Press, 1967.

Discusses the mythology Dunsany created in his fantasy works and highlights Dunsany's literary career to 1928.

Greene, Graham. Review of The Curse of the Wise Woman, by Lord Dunsany. The Spectator 151, No. 5497 (3 November 933): 638.

Praises texture and technique in the novel but complains of "the intrusion … of the supernatural, a growing prettiness and unreality in simile."

Hamilton, Clayton. "The Plays of Lord Dunsany." The Bookman (New York) XLIV, No. 5 (January 1917): 469-79.

Appreciative survey of Dunsany's early dramas.

—. "Lord Dunsany: Personal Impressions." In his Seen on the Stage, pp. 237-48. New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1920.

Recalls several meetings and conversations with Dunsany regarding his dramas.

Heaney, Seamus. "The Labourer and the Lord." The Listener 88, No. 2270 (28 September 1972): 408-09.

An account of the friendship between Dunsany and Meath poet Francis Ledwidge occasioned by biographies of Dunsany and Ledwidge and the reissue of My Talks with Dean Spanley and The Curse of the Wise Woman.

Krutch, J. W. "Knights Errant." The Nation (New York) XV, No. 2992 (8 November 1922): 503-04.

Unfavorable review of Don Rodriguez. According to Krutch, "No other book of this writer has revealed so glaringly his essential defect although the same defect is apparent in all his work. The soul of a legend is the spirit of a folk and Lord Dunsany is fatally literary."

Llwyd, J. P. D. "Lord Dunsany: A Herald of the New Romance." The Dalhousie Review III, No. 4 (January 1924): 74-82.

Focuses on Dunsany's early fantasy tales.

Nicoll, Allardyce. "The Minority Drama: The Poetic and Literary Drama." In his English Drama, 1900-1930: The Beginnings of the Modern Period, pp. 283-323. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973.

Includes Dunsany's major works in a survey of early twentieth-century theater.

O'Conor, Norreys Jephson. "Lord Dunsany: Irishman." In his Changing Ireland: Literary Backgrounds of the Irish Free State, 1889-1922, pp. 148-56. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1924.

Identifies Celtic characteristics in Dunsany's works.

O'Faoláin, Sean. Review of Up in the Hills, by Lord Dunsany. The Spectator 155, No. 5599 (18 October 1935): 628.

Calls the novel a "light-hearted and charming saga by one of the very few modern Irish writers who can still… be merry without being satirically cruel."

Priestley, J. B. Review of The King of Elfland's Daughter, by Lord Dunsany. The London Mercury X, No. 58 (August 924): 427-29.

Favorable notice calling the novel Dunsany's "best piece of writing so far."

Schweitzer, Darrell. Pathways to Elfland: The Writings of Lord Dunsany. Philadelphia: Owlswick Press, 1989, 180 p.

Comprehensive critical overview of Dunsany's works.

Shepard, Odell. "Lord Dunsany: Myth-Maker." Scribner's Magazine LXIX, No. 5 (May 1921): 595-99.

Locates Dunsany among the lower rank of literary artists, noting "a certain monotony of total effect which is almost always felt when one reads several of his plays or tales in close succession."

Additional coverage of Dunsany's life and career is contained in the following sources published by Gale Research: Contemporary Authors, Vol. 104; Dictionary of Literary Biography, Vols. 10, 77; and Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism, Vol. 2.