Though now largely forgotten, playwright T. W. Robertson was in his own day widely credited with helping to revolutionize British drama. Inventor of the so-called “cup-and-saucer” comedy and inspiration for the character Tom Wrench in playwright Arthur Wing Pinero’s
Trelawny of the “Wells”(1898),
Robertson helped bring a new kind of realism to the English stage.
Like many writers before and since, however, Robertson became an overnight sensation only after a lifetime of hard work. Born in 1829, he descended from a long line of provincial theater folk: his mother was an actress; both his grandfather and an uncle were lead comedic actors in the York Circuit Company, while the Lincoln Circuit Company was managed first by another uncle and then, after 1831, by his aunt and his
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Citation: Mays, Kelly J.. "Thomas William Robertson". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 22 February 2012 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=3815, accessed 25 November 2024.]
