Daniel Pratt Mannix IV was a remarkable American writer, journalist, photographer, sideshow performer, stage magician, animal trainer, and filmmaker. His diverse career included being a sword swallower and fire eater in a traveling carnival sideshow, performing as a stage magician under the name 'The Great Zadma', and training animals like eagles.

One of his two best-known works is the 1958 book Those About to Die (republished in 2001 as The Way of the Gladiator), which inspired the Ridley Scott film Gladiator in 2000 and the TV drama Those About to Die on Peacock. His other famous work is the 1967 novel The Fox and the Hound, which was adapted into an animated feature film by Walt Disney Productions in 1981.

Over his lifetime, Mannix authored more than 25 books, covering a variety of subjects from fictional animal stories for children, the natural history of animals, to sensational adult non-fiction titles.