Lionel Ramsay Hale (26 October 1909 – 1 January 1977) was an English critic, broadcaster and playwright.

He made regular appearances on Panorama between 1953 and 1955 as a theatre critic,[2] and was featured as a castaway on the BBC Radio programme Desert Island Discs on 3 January 1958.

[3] One of Hale's plays, These Two, ran for a short time (eight days) on Broadway in May, 1934.

[4] He was also a frequent contributor to Punch, the British humour magazine.

Their son was the publisher and literary agent James Hale (1946-2003).