author
David Gray
1870–1968
A newspaperman turned novelist and playwright, he went on to have an unexpectedly wide-ranging life that included war service in World War I and a high-profile diplomatic posting in Ireland during World War II. His career moved easily between journalism, fiction, the stage, and public service.
1 Audiobook
Mr. Carteret and Others
by David Gray
About the author
Born in Buffalo, New York, in 1870, he studied at Harvard and began his working life in journalism before also practicing law. He later built a literary career as a novelist, short story writer, and playwright, showing an ease with both popular storytelling and the theater.
His life reached well beyond the writing desk. During World War I he served in France with the U.S. Signal Corps and as a liaison officer with French forces, and he was later honored by France for that service. In 1940, President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed him U.S. minister to Ireland, a post he held through much of the Second World War.
That mix of reporter, author, soldier, and diplomat gives his work an unusual backdrop. He is remembered not only for his fiction and stage writing, but also for a public life that placed him close to some of the major events of the first half of the twentieth century.