// Gets the first filesystem root. On most systems this will be / or c:\ def fsRoot = File.listRoots().first() // Create our list of files (including directories) def files = [ new File("input.txt"), new File(fsRoot, "input.txt"), new File("docs"), new File(fsRoot, "docs") ] /* We use it.directory to determine whether each file is a regular file or directory. If it is a directory, we delete it with deleteDir(), otherwise we just use delete(). */ files.each{ it.directory ? it.deleteDir() : it.delete() }