Dorothy Gladys "Dodie" Smith was an English novelist and playwright. She is best known for writing I Capture the Castle (1948) and the children's novel The Hundred and One Dalmatians (1956). Other notable works include Dear Octopus (1938) and The Starlight Barking (1967). The Hundred and One Dalmatians was adapted into a 1961 animated film and a 1996 live-action film, both produced by Disney. Her novel I Capture the Castle was voted number 82 as "one of the nation's 100 best-loved novels" by the British public as part of the BBC's The Big Read (2003), and was adapted into a film released the same year.

Born Dorothy Gladys Smith in Lancashire, England, Dodie Smith was raised in Manchester. She was just an infant when her father died, and she grew up fatherless until age 14, when her mother remarried and the family moved to London. There, she studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and attempted a career as an actress, but with little success. She finally wound up taking a job as a toy buyer for a furniture store to make ends meet. Giving up dreams of an acting career, she turned to writing plays, and in 1931, her first play, Autumn Crocus, was published (under the pseudonym "C.L. Anthony").