John Taintor Foote (March 29, 1881 - January 28, 1950) was a novelist, playwright, short-story writer, and screenwriter.

Foote studied at Kenyon Military Academy, Gambier Ohio. He began as a writer of sporting stories. His first story was published in The American Magazine in 1913. He wrote horse stories featuring the roguish track character Blister Jones, and "The Song of the Dragon", the story upon which the Alfred Hitchcock film Notorious is based.

Foote came to Hollywood in 1938 to work on the screenplay of his book The Look of Eagles, which was retitled Kentucky, starred Loretta Young, and won an Academy Award for Walter Brennan. Foote?s subsequent scripts included The Mark of Zorro, Broadway Serenade, Swanee River, The Story of Seabiscuit and The Great Dan Patch.

Set during World War I in New York, "The Song of the Dragon" told the tale of a theatrical producer approached by federal agents, who want his assistance in recruiting an actress he once had a relationship with to seduce the leader of a gang of enemy saboteurs. The story had appeared as a two-part serial in the Saturday Evening Post in November 1921; David O. Selznick, who owned the rights to it, had passed it on to Hitchcock from his unproduced story file during the filming of Spellbound. Although the story was a nominal starting point that "offered some inspiration, the final narrative was pure Hitchcock."

Dozier's interest rekindled Selznick's, which up to that point had only been tepid. Perhaps what started Hitchcock's mind rolling was "The Song of the Dragon", a short story by John Taintor Foote which had appeared as a two-part serial in the Saturday Evening Post in November 1921; Selznick, who owned the rights to it, had passed it on to Hitchcock from his unproduced story file during the filming of Spellbound.[13] Set during World War I in New York, "The Song of the Dragon" told the tale of a theatrical producer approached by federal agents, who want his assistance in recruiting an actress he once had a relationship with to seduce the leader of a gang of enemy saboteurs.[15] Although the story was a nominal starting point that "offered some inspiration, the final narrative was pure Hitchcock."[16]

There is no entry about the novel available on Wikipedia at this time, but here is a link to the film entry.