John Palmer

Born in London in 1885, John Leslie Palmer built a wide-ranging career as an English theatre critic and author. Writing under his own name, he published books on early English actors and on major literary figures, showing a strong interest in performance, history, and the lives behind famous names.

He also wrote fiction under several pseudonyms, including John Somers and Christopher Haddon, and worked with Hilary St. George Saunders on novels published as Francis Beeding. That collaborative work helped make him known to a broad readership beyond the world of criticism and literary biography.

Palmer died in London in 1944. His career stands out for its versatility: he could write seriously about the stage and literary history, then turn to entertaining fiction for a very different audience.