author
Ronald Fraser
1888–1974
A British diplomat and novelist, he brought the strangeness of war, public service, and imagination into fiction that often slips into fantasy and speculative territory. His books have a thoughtful, offbeat quality that still feels distinctive.
1 Audiobook
Landscape with figures
by Ronald Fraser
About the author
Born in London on November 3, 1888, Sir Arthur Ronald Fraser was educated at St Paul's School and served in Flanders and France during the First World War. After being wounded and left unfit for further military service, he moved into government work, joining the British Foreign Office and beginning a long career in civil and diplomatic service.
Fraser later held a series of economic and commercial posts abroad, including work in Argentina, France, and Egypt, and he was knighted in 1949. Alongside that official career, he wrote novels and shorter fiction, much of it blending everyday life with fantasy or science-fictional ideas.
He is especially remembered for imaginative works such as The Flying Draper and for later novels that explored unusual, often quietly philosophical premises. Fraser died on September 12, 1974, leaving behind a body of work that links literary fantasy with the experience of a man who had seen both war and diplomacy at close range.